Images: Snif/Notewrks
Colors, music, and moods give Snif’s male customers an easy prescription.
There’s a point where a mass market fragrance brand gets so mass-ive that it has to make a crucial choice. Either it keeps trying to be everything to everyone, or it creates clearer lanes so people actually know where they fit. That’s the moment Snif seems to be in right now, as they launch the new sub-brand Notewrks, a sharp pivot towards the male schnozz. “Cologne by Snif” is the phrase you find on each bottle here.
This isn’t Snif’s first “sub brand” either. Having raised over $27 million in funding, the brand’s success in its 5+ years comes from removing the friction around discovery, and pairing direct-to-consumer access with a steady flow of new scents (which encouraged experimentation rather than commitment, and much conversation therein). That model proved strong enough to support the first spinoff, Secret Menu, which pushed further into playful, limited-run concepts and gourmand profiles, expanding the brand’s creative range without diluting its core identity.
Secret Menu and Notewrks are proof positive that different people want different things—and let’s go as far as saying that many male and female customs want different things too—and that it’s okay to design for that directly. Heck, I love the scents they did with Professor Perfume (a fellow South Dakota native, whoop whoop!). Her scents are called Vow Factor and Honey Suite, but I would never outwardly recommend them to most of my male friends; they’re clearly targeting a female demo. Again, that’s OK! Which is why I’m excited to see Snif make such an intentional run for the male nose.
It’s just giving them something they can immediately understand and decide on—the pragmatic consumer, let’s say. (And, if I may admit, the majority of male consumers.) It’s just acknowledging that most people want to know what something is, when to wear it, and whether it fits into their life.
I got an early sample of the three Notewrks launch scents, and had the chance to speak 1 on 1 with Snif co-founder and co-CEO Bryan Edwards about the new sub brand. You can read that below. But first, a quick introduction into those three launch accords.
There are three core Notewrks scents out of the gate, all well under $100 in their 30ml vessels. For the time being, they are available at Snif.co. (Snif itself also retails at Ulta, but for now not including Notewrks.)
Instead of leaning into abstract fragrance language or pretending men want to decode scent pyramids, Notewrks leans into color, mood, and music… all familiar reference points. It should be easy to prescribe yourself one of them, too.
The perfect signature daily wear, sophisticated but understated. A true fresh “skin scent”.
And, “blue” aside, this is my (Adam’s) favorite of the trio too; it really wills satisfy most guys’ needs for a low-cost, high-mileage signature scent.
The most upbeat and energetic of the three. Fresh without being sharp, warm without being heavy.
Warmer, richer, and more noticeable. A masculine, not-overly-candied gourmand.
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Edwards: It’s funny, because originally Snif was built to be pretty genderless. That was always the idea. But when we actually looked at the data, around 80 percent of our customers were women. And when we stepped back, it became clear that while the brand was inclusive, there wasn’t really something built specifically for men in a way that felt intentional. Men’s fragrance still feels underserved. There’s a lot of prestige, but not a lot that feels approachable or designed around how men actually shop.
The way I think about it is similar to how Nike operates with Jordan. Jordan isn’t separate from Nike, but it has its own language, its own energy, and its own audience. That’s how Notewrks functions. It’s not meant to replace Snif or compete with it. It’s a focused lane within the same ecosystem, built to speak more directly to a certain type of customer while still benefiting from the larger brand behind it.
A lot of the thinking came down to removing friction. Instead of trying to impress people with complexity, the goal was to make things feel understandable. That meant being more direct, more visual, and more intuitive. Rather than asking people to decode fragrance language, the idea was to make it easier to know what something is and how it fits into your life. It wasn’t about dumbing anything down, just about making the experience more human.
Music became a natural way to communicate feeling without overexplaining. Everyone understands how a song makes them feel, even if they can’t articulate why. That made it a useful bridge for fragrance, which can otherwise be abstract or intimidating.
We started thinking about scent the same way you think about a playlist. And then color coding with the blue, yellow, and red bottles extends that mood further:
Blue feels familiar and everyday. Yellow feels brighter, lighter, more open. Red feels warmer and more intimate.
Those cues do a lot of the work for you before you ever smell anything.
I think when you really look at it, men’s retail just hasn’t evolved in the same way. If you walk into a store, especially a beauty or fragrance store, there’s still very little that feels designed with men in mind. A lot of it feels intimidating or overly precious. There’s prestige everywhere, but not a lot of accessibility.
When you look at the data, men are buying fragrance, but the experience hasn’t been built around how they actually shop. There’s this assumption that if something is high-end, it has to feel complicated or serious. That creates a barrier. A lot of guys walk in, look around, and don’t really see themselves reflected in the space.
That’s where we saw the opportunity. Not to water things down, but to make them clearer. To create something that feels intentional and considered without being intimidating. Something that says, “You belong here,” without having to explain itself.
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