Stepping into the store is like stepping into a bright, colorful house: Everywhere you look, there is a different fragrance oil on the shelf. In the center of the store is a round table with three tiers, each holding a different scent, ranging from cotton candy to lavender, with over 70 scents in total. The store allows you to mix these scents together to create your own one-of-a-kind fragrance.
Uncommon Scents, located in the Meridian Building on 18th Avenue and Willamette Street, has served the Eugene community for more than 40 years. The store prides itself on being one of the only stores in the United States where customers can create their own fragrances. Owner Eva Promen refers to it as a “destination shop” where anyone and everyone are welcome.
Promen is a scent expert who prides herself on her knowledge of the scents the store carries. She has never encountered a blend that she didn’t like. She buys the oils from various distributors, then sells them either as single “notes” or puts the scents into lotions or bath and shower gels.
“Scent is often described as musical notes, high notes, low notes and bass notes,” she said, “because there is really no language for scent itself. I describe top notes as being more citrus smells, floral are more middle notes and woodsy scents are the bass notes.”
Because of the range of products the store provides, all types of people are attracted to it.
“Generations have been coming to the store,” she said. “People have been refilling their fragrance bottles for 35 years.”
The store is quite small for the range of product it carries. Not only does it sell products from the Uncommon Scents brand, but it also carries 70 other different vendors’ products, including more common brands like Crabtree and Evelyn. Each section of the store carries completely different things besides the oils: One side carries clothes while the other carries tote bags.
“I choose all the vendors; I pick the ones that I believe my customer will like the most,” she said.
To make an “Uncommon Scent” is quite easy. The first step is to choose a couple of scents that are appealing. Promen describes the mixtures as “blends.”
“I believe that mixing three to four ‘notes,’” she said, “create the best blend but the most common number is two.” After they’re chosen, she mixes them together in a glass bottle, which then creates a one-of-a-kind scent.
She enjoys interacting with the customers and giving them a shopping experience they have never had before.
“If people are told that it smells good on them,” she said, “that’s the one thing that makes people keep coming back to their scent — it’s an amazingly individual feeling.”
Promen would love to stay with this company for the rest of her life: “As long as I can stay owning this store,” she said, “I will. It allows me to be creative and I love it.”