Jasmine Birtles
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Make money with empty perfume bottles
Teresa Etheredge
15th Feb 2020
Packaging is often thrown away, but empty perfume bottles are too pretty to be chucked in the bin. Wash with soap and water or rinse with alcohol, and upcycle into gorgeous products you would be proud to sell at a craft stall.
Make your own perfume
Perfume is easier to make than many realise! In your fancy old bottles, your concoctions will look as good as they smell. Many recipes, tips and tricks can be found on the internet along with training courses and teach-yourself videos.
A perfume scent is made up of chords, and each chord has three parts:
- The top or head note is what you notice when you go in for a sniff; it catches your attention, but evaporates much quicker than the rest due to its lighter composition. Common head notes might include orange, lemon, lavender, grapefruit or berry scents.
- The middle or heart note combines with both the head and base notes, and is often floral, fruity or spicy with fragrances like geranium, rose, coriander, nutmeg or jasmine.
- The base note is rich and full, lingering on the skin long after the head notes have faded; it might include vanilla, patchouli, musk, sandlewood or oakmoss.
Ingredients:
- Essential oils – choosing which scents to include is the creative part. You can add anything from cinnamon or lavender to frankincense or myrrh. Remember to keep a notepad handy to jot down the amount of drops you’re adding to your recipe.
- Alternatively, you can use fragrance oils which are less natural (as they are often combined with synthetics) but are less likely to irritate the skin.
- Carrier oil – this is important to dilute the essential oil, which can damage your skin in its pure form. The most popular types include jojoba, avocado kernel, coconut, avocado and almond oils.
- Vodka or pure grain alcohol, to transform the perfume oil into eau de perfume.
So… what do you do?
You use this great guide from the Sweet Pea Apothecary, also known as Immortal Perfumes, to help you out. (It explains the whole process far better than we ever could.)
When making perfume yourself, you can customise it to exactly how you like it. For example, many find that the more affordable scents sold in perfumeries and pharmacies are too overpowering for their personal tastes. You can sell this at craft stalls, or maybe even set up your own perfumery!
Find out more about how to sell homemade perfume here.
Sell antique or collectable perfume bottles
Many people have started collections of the prettiest glass bottles, and some rare or vintage perfume bottles have been known to sell at quite handsome prices. Have a look at sites like:
Although this won’t make you rich, it will be nice pocket money. Common selling prices lie between £2 and £8, but the more extravagant pieces can sell for hundreds of pounds!
Create home décor pieces
Rather than selling them just as they are, try transforming empty perfume bottles into beautiful decorations and ornaments.
Paperweights
Fill the tiny bottles with broken jewellery, odd beads, coloured sand or shells.
Snow globes
Fill the large round bottles with flakes of paper or sprinkles of glitter.
Reed diffusers
These last longer than scented candles and are much less demanding to make. Take a look at this quick method here.
Vase
Easy, simple, and looks great, especially for buds or small fake flowers.
Oil lamps
Bring out your inner Aladdin following these genie-us tutorials, here or here. Just swap the mason jars or root beer bottles for your empty perfume bottles instead.
Candle holder
This Lovely Greens tutorial shows you how to make candles inside old wine bottles but, once again, this should work equally well with empty perfume bottles.
Suncatcher
This link here contains one method of making a suncatcher, but you can also string bottles along a length of wood as has been done here. Suncatchers are definitely for the more creative among us – maybe you could use the glass-cutting skills you learnt when making candle-holders, and string smaller pieces of glass alongside shells, beads, or broken jewellery.
Find out more about upcycling here. You can even make money selling your old toilet rolls!
Do you buy perfume bottles? I have many
Beware you cannot sell decorated Chanel bottles even if you take the labels off (except for personal use) You can sell an empty bottle but you cannot sell decorated Chanel bottles…Why? because Chanel will claim copyright. Whereas most perfume companies do not mind, Chanel are against you using and selling decorated Chanel bottles. I find it ridiculous when we are told to recycle, recycle, recycle and yet Chanel would rather we chucked them in the bin. I am of the opinion that if I have paid money for that bottle of perfume, it is mine to do whatever I like… Read more »
Right. I’m sure the Chanel lawyers are gonna march right up to the church yard craft stand and demand you remove your upcycled Chanel projects.
Nice ideas you shared with us. To reuse the perfume bottle and make your own perfume and fill it in the perfect and unique one bottle.
Good idea to repurpose used perfume bottles as they are still appealing objects.