Fragrance oils are synthesized scents that give various products their pleasant, distinctive aromas. They are made up of a combination of aroma chemicals, essential oils, and essential oil components, with over 3500 materials approved for use in fragrance oils. Fragrance oils do not have full ingredient disclosure and fall under ‘Trade Secret’ status with the FDA, so simply putting “Fragrance” on an ingredient list will suffice.
The ingredients in fragrance oils can be either natural or synthetic. Essential oils are pure liquids containing aroma compounds that are removed from the seeds, flowers, leaves, roots, and stems or bark of plants through methods such as distillation, expression, or extraction. These oils carry the distinctive essence, or scent, of the plant it was made from and are frequently used in perfumes, flavorings, and medicines. Fragrance oils can also be made with synthetic aroma chemicals, which come in powder or liquid form. Solvents and diluents are also used in fragrance oils to help the components of a fragrance burn more easily, blend better, improve fragrance throw, and increase fragrance longevity.
Some synthetic fragrance oils can be composed of as many as 80 chemical ingredients, so these are the fragrance oils to be wary of if you have any skin or fragrance sensitivities. On a cosmetics label, synthetic fragrance oils could be labeled as perfume, fragrance, fragrance oil, or parfum. Natural fragrance oils are made from natural isolates and are not made by chemists in a lab from synthetic compounds. They are composed almost entirely of petroleum by-products such as benzene derivatives, aldehydes, toluene, and other known toxic chemicals.
In summary, fragrance oils are made up of a combination of aroma chemicals, essential oils, and essential oil components, with over 3500 materials approved for use in fragrance oils. They can be either natural or synthetic, and fragrance oils do not have full ingredient disclosure. Essential oils are pure liquids containing aroma compounds that are removed from the seeds, flowers, leaves, roots, and stems or bark of plants, while synthetic aroma chemicals are used when no essential oil is available. Solvents and diluents are also used in fragrance oils to help the components of a fragrance burn more easily, blend better, improve fragrance throw, and increase fragrance longevity.
