Fragrance lab opens in Winter Park as perfume category booms

Fragrance has become one of beauty’s strongest growth stories, and a new Winter Park business is betting that consumers don’t just want to buy perfume. They want to make it.

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Tijon Fragrance Lab opened this week at 1015 S. Orlando Ave., bringing hands-on perfume-making to a 1,500-square-foot space formerly occupied by Harwood-Watson Dance Studios. The Winter Park location is owned by franchisee Alyce Bartolomeo, a longtime entrepreneur who said she was drawn to the business after taking a Tijon class in Tampa.

“I loved it,” Bartolomeo told GrowthSpotter. “The experience was amazing, and I said, ‘I want to do this.’”

The opening comes as fragrance continues to outperform much of the beauty sector. Spate’s 2026 fragrance trends report cited fragrance as the No. 1 beauty category by year-over-year growth, up 18%, while Circana reported fragrance was among beauty’s strongest performers in the first quarter of 2026, with gains across both mass and prestige channels. McKinsey and Business of Fashion have also projected fragrance to be the strongest-performing beauty category over the next several years.

Detroit-based Kelly Jones, founder of fragrance brand Kelly+Jones and not affiliated with Tijon, has been in the perfume business for almost three decades, and noticed a pivotal shift during the Covid-19 pandemic. While fragrance enthusiasts once occupied a niche corner of the beauty world, she said lockdowns, social media and the rise of “FragranceTok” helped transform perfume into a mainstream hobby, with consumers collecting scents, discussing fragrance notes and seeking out immersive experiences such as scent bars and perfume-making workshops.

“It’s teaching people that perfumery can be accessible,” Jones said. “It’s making it less intimidating. It’s making it approachable and fun and not some secret world in Paris that you can’t be a part of.”

Since the pandemic, Orlando has seen several custom fragrance outfits open: La Jetée Perfumery in Ivanhoe Village (2021), Rouge Beauty Lab in Ocoee (2022), Exuma Fragrance Co., which operates classes out of Colonialtown’s House of Lang (2023), Orlando Candle & Lip Gloss Lab near Belle Isle (2025), and several mobile units that will come to your home or event space, like Opulence by JAI (2025) and Essence Fragrance Bar (2025).

At Tijon, customers can choose from several classes, including a 45-minute express experience, a 90-minute mix-and-match class, a date-night option and a three-hour masterclass. The mix-and-match class lets customers create three custom fragrances and bottle their favorite.

Bartolomeo said she chose Winter Park for her first store because it is where she lives and spends much of her time. She also owns the franchise rights for Orlando, where she hopes to open in the tourism corridor next year.

Bartolomeo looked at multiple locations in Winter Park before settling on the Orlando Avenue space.

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“I wanted somewhere that was the right size and had a lot of traffic, so people would see us, someplace that was convenient and had good parking,” she said.

The Tijon concept began in St. Martin in 2007 and has since expanded. The Winter Park lab joins a growing franchise network of 16 locations across the U.S. and Caribbean. Franchise documents show prospective operators pay a $29,750 franchise fee and face estimated startup costs ranging from $150,000 to $225,000, covering buildout, equipment and initial inventory. The company provides a two-week training program for franchisees and does not require prior fragrance industry experience.

For customers, the appeal is part science lesson, part creative escape. Bartolomeo said guests learn about top, middle and base notes, then blend oils into a finished eau de parfum.

“Some people come in, and their hands are shaking as they’re putting the oil in the beaker,” she said. “Come in and have fun. This is your time. There’s no right or wrong here.”

Jones, who once operated her own scent bar before later working in the fragrance industry in New York, said fine fragrance is highly technical, involving chemistry, safety standards and complex formulas. Still, the growing interest in scent is also creating community, she said, much like wine culture has done for casual drinkers and serious enthusiasts alike.

Comparing fragrance culture to wine culture, Jones said consumers don’t need expert-level knowledge to participate.

“You don’t have to be a sommelier to enjoy wine,” Jones said. “A lot of people are intimidated by wine, but there are different levels of wine knowledge. Why not just have a wine bar where you can come in and say, ‘You know what? I want to learn about Pinot Grigio.’ A fragrance bar offers that kind of accessibility, too.”

For Bartolomeo, that sense of discovery is the point.

“They think they know what’s going to happen, and they’re just blown away,” she said. “They love it, and they want to bring their friends back.”

Have a tip about Central Florida development? Contact me at [email protected] or (407) 420-5246. Follow GrowthSpotter on Facebook and LinkedIn.

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