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It’s 2011 and Frances Shoemack, based in Amsterdam with her husband and two young sons, wanders into an art gallery on a visit to Antwerp and discovers her appreciation for the artisan perfumes that are on display. She had never felt this enchanted by the glitzy world of Duty Free fragrance. 

At the time, Viktor and Rolf Flowerbomb, YSL Babydoll and sexy-shaped scents by Britney and J.Lo reigned supreme, but they all felt too artificial for someone who grew up on a farm in South Canterbury with a yoga teacher mum, and had used organic products for most of her life. 

Inspired by her gallery visit, Shoemack started looking for a natural perfume within that category, but had a hard time finding one she could buy.

Walking into premium beauty boutiques, the response she would get when she asked for a natural perfume was “we don't do natural, you'll have to go to the organic supermarket.”

This was 10 years ago - plenty of luxury ‘clean’ makeup and skincare options were around, but natural perfume wasn't taken seriously, and as Shoemack recalls, it had a bit of a “hippy hangover.” 

After an unsuccessful search, she began to ask herself why no one was doing niche artisan perfume, working with natural ingredients or looking at the supply chain and sustainability.

A key reason behind Shoemack’s brainwave was her background as a winemaker, and an early obsession with quality ingredients. “There’s a saying in the wine industry, that you can’t make good wine from bad grapes, and the same applies to perfume. I felt there were enough similarities between the two industries and thought, ‘oh yeah, I can do this’." 

A natural approach to fragrance was one thing, but unlike a bottle of wine, which proudly displays the origins of its contents on the label, the fragrance industry is notoriously protective of ‘trade secrets’ and cagey about where ingredients are sourced.

This outdated convention didn’t sit right with Shoemack, especially on learning that more than 95% of the ingredients used in most big name brands were made of petrochemical derivatives.

Luckily, Shoemack was able to hunt down a master perfumer - of which there are only around 50 in the world - amazingly also a New Zealander, based in Brazil, who could help her on her mission to create a 100% natural perfume. 

“I came across a video of [master perfumer] Isaac Sinclair, standing in the Waitakere Ranges in the native bush of Aotearoa, talking about how perfume is like fine wine. It was a bit of a eureka moment.” Shoemack had found the only New Zealand nose in the industry, and he couldn’t have been a better match for her vision. 

Shoemack and Sinclair worked together from the ground-up to create their first perfume, a woody, spicy scent they named Vintage 13 (later called Red Santal), a nod to her wine-making roots and the year they launched. 

Their natural fragrance got the attention of a high profile beauty retailer Skins Cosmetics in the Netherlands (a Mecca equivalent in Aotearoa) who believed in the vision and wanted to launch Vintage 13 through their stores. 

From there, Abel wafted through Europe and grew organically. Within two years they were stocked in department stores and boutiques across Germany, Scandinavia, France, Spain and Denmark; an impressive feat considering they only had one perfume. 

After some scrappy years bootstrapping the business “off the smell of an oily rag”, Abel Odor - named after her and Sinclair’s shared connection to the Abel Tasman - was ready for its first step-change. 

With some trusted partners on board, Shoemack and her husband sold their house in Auckland and put a significant amount of the proceeds towards building a collection of seven fragrances - from modern florals and greens to sultry musk - and expanding distribution to 33 countries including Japan, Hong Kong and the United States. 

On reflection, choosing to leave a relatively cushy job to start up her own business, oceans away from home and with two small children, was a decision that required dogged determination “and a healthy dose of naivety” to get her through. 

“I would say comparison is the thief of joy, you need to keep your head down and be gutsy.”

Shoemack and her family moved back to Aotearoa just before the pandemic hit, choosing Wellington as their home, which had “a similar creative vibe to Amsterdam” but with the support network of family and friends. Transitioning to a country on the opposite side of the world to her producers in Holland and distributors in Europe was always going to be a challenge, but Shoemack found help from her bank to make the process easy and automatic. 

“When I was looking for a banking partner to set up with in Aotearoa, BNZ came highly recommended from friends who had worked with them here. The business interfaces are super intuitive, I was able to access other currency accounts really easily which is obviously important. They have an awesome business lounge in Wellington so I could do everything remotely.”

Today, Shoemack is the proud owner of a world-class, multi-million dollar brand with its own fabriek (Dutch for factory) in Wellington’s Aro Valley and a strong global presence in 25 markets, having pulled out of a few to focus more extensively on others. 

She’s come a long way since her first foray into natural perfume in Amsterdam a decade ago, and the industry as a whole has too, with U.S beauty giants like Sephora now recognising natural ‘conscious’ brands within their fragrance offering. 

“There's so much momentum in the category at the moment,” she says. “We were one of the first ones there and we really want to catch that wave.” 

The desire to keep leading the pack drove her to go out for a first round of funding this year. “Beyond money, it’s really about finding the right strategic partner, who is globally relevant and who can help us fast track to building our U.S market which is a priority.”

With another step-change ahead of her, powered by strategic investment, Abel is well set-up to keep leading the natural fragrance curve and pushing for a more mindful approach in the industry as a whole.

“We’ve always displayed our full ingredients from day one, but regulations still don’t require fragrance to disclose an ingredients list, so I think that total lack of transparency is one of the main reasons why it's been slower to change than other beauty and skincare.”  

Shoemack is clearly in tune with her customer base, and if anyone is going to make real changes to the perfume industry she’s a good bet to put your money on.

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