Raquel Bouris, 27, from Cronulla in Sydney’s southeast, started her perfume empire, Who is Elijah, after becoming obsessed with a wild, gender-neutral fragrance at Coachella
A busy mom who risked everything to build her own perfume empire has been rewarded with record sales from her new launch — selling one bottle every 50 seconds, making her more than $58,000 in a week.
Raquel Bouris, 27, from Cronulla in Sydney’s southeast, started her perfume empire, Who is Elijah, after becoming obsessed with a wild, gender-neutral fragrance at Coachella.
She was never able to recreate the fragrance that made her decide to open a store, but told FEMAIL she is still obsessed with every fragrance in her collection.
The latest is Nightcap – a fragrance that reminds her of her husband – and has proven to be the company’s biggest overnight success, with wholesalers coming back for more than seven days after it hits the shelves.
“In the last week they sold 70% of the stock and sold 1 NIGHTCAP fragrance every 50 seconds,” she said.
Raquel describes the scent as “sexy and moody” and said customers asked for more masculine scents — and she was happy to deliver.
And for the mom of two, Nightcap has a few personal touches too.
“My husband and I spent a lot of evenings together and it’s memories and fun things that we want to keep reliving and remembering and this is where the first inspiration came from,” she said.
“My husband and I spent a lot of evenings together and it’s memories and fun things that we want to keep reliving and remembering and this is where the first inspiration came from,” she said.
The latest is Nightcap – a fragrance that reminds her of her husband – and has proven to be the company’s biggest overnight success, with wholesalers coming back for more than seven days after it hit the shelves.
“Adam (my husband) and I are house bodies by nature, but we are also night owls and night owls who like to go out and have fun.”
Raquel has always been drawn to more masculine scents and found that there wasn’t really anything on the market that fully appealed to her taste.
So when she stumbled upon “the most amazing smell” on the Coachella dance floor in 2017, she was instantly obsessed.
“She was just carrying a cheap fragrance oil from India – when I got home I couldn’t find it locally, so I ended up buying 40 bottles wholesale,” she laughed.
Raquel Bouris, 27, from Cronulla in Sydney’s south east launched her perfume business in 2018 after being inspired by a visit to Coachella
It’s been four busy years for Raquel, who spent the first two years working full-time as she built her business and also started a family – with two children with partner Adam, pictured
After realizing it appealed to almost everyone, Raquel decided she wanted to see if she could bottle the scent as perfume instead of oil.
But it was impossible to make an exact match due to the complex nature of the fragrance.
Far from disheartened, the young woman continued to work with her perfumer, and they came up with a fragrance that she “definitely fell in love with” – despite being completely different from the one that had inspired her.
This perfume, which combines traditional masculine and feminine notes, became the showpiece of ‘Who is Elijah?’.
His/Her was launched in October 2018 – it took three months to sell the first 150 bottles.
But Raquel was confident in her scent and had already poured $20,000 into the company, so was determined to make it work.
“I realized it would be very difficult to sell a perfume based on a photo and a very small number of social media followers,” she said.
Raquel now works full time for himself and sells 3500 bottles of perfume every week
“But I wanted to make it work, so I put all my free time into the business—always lunch breaks and hours before and after work.”
The company’s growth was slow, Raquel still had to work full-time to support herself.
She and her partner Adam had also decided to start a family after starting the business and now have a three-year-old and newborn baby.
This meant that she also had to consider her ability to support her family.
Raquel’s trip to Coachella, pictured at the 2017 festival with now husband Adam, inspired her leap into the perfume market
Raquel, pictured here with Adam, got inspired after smelling an ‘amazing’ oil at the festival
In 2020, when the world went into lockdown in response to the Corona virus, Raquel approached David Jones to stock her perfume.
“They hadn’t had a new fragrance for a long time and decided to stock it in some of their best stores without even smelling it – because they loved the look and loved that it was all Australian,” said they.
Since then, the company has grown much faster, in July 2020 Raquel was able to quit her full-time job to focus on her brand.
After two years of putting everything into the business for two, she was able to pay for herself too.
In the second half of 2021, the brand exploded after it was acquired by Adore Beauty – now she and her husband both work full-time in the company and have better pay than their previous jobs.
Raquel is pictured here with her daughter who was born on Christmas Day in 2021 and says raising a family and a business at the same time meant sacrificing sleep
Raquel is excited about how her business is growing after putting so much time and energy into it
“It hasn’t been easy, we made a lot of sacrifices – especially sleeping and missing events when I gave myself a tough deadline,” she said.
“We have had help from our family with our son and also put him in daycare.”
The 2020 David Jones stock was mom’s first “pinch me” moment, the second being when she realized Adore Beauty would be placing $30,000 orders weekly.
“They just love the perfumes and so do their customers,” she said.
The company now sells more than 3,500 bottles a week and has five perfumes in its range.
‘In the beginning I just reinvested everything, I put money into marketing, good packaging and developing other fragrances.’
His/her remains the bestseller, but the recent addition ‘Nomad’ is fast becoming a favorite.
Raquel’s husband has quit his full-time job and now works in the company – both earning more than at their previous jobs and building a financially secure future
Raquel and her husband also sell to the US – but because perfume is classified as a dangerous good, it is difficult to ship.
So they go to the states – where it all started – to set up a local operation.
Despite never being able to capture the original scent of the oil she fell in love with in Coachella, Raquel is far from disappointed.
“I fell in love with him/her and a lot of other people too – we sold a ton of them last year – so I believe everything happens for a reason.”
The perfumes are all unisex – Raquel says they have been described as “the most stealable” fragrance on the market.
“Women will take it home and then their husbands will use it as if it were their own.”