You can order perfume online. There are lots of great sites that offer real scents (not knock-offs or spoofs) and will send you your stuff through the mail.

But what if you don't have the time or you would just rather see and smell what you're buying before you buy? By all means, get to the perfume counter of a big department store. This is about the best place to find all the main scents under one roof in a convenient display.

The trouble is, this convenient display is home to an army of salespeople. For some reason, a lot of people can feel intimidated by these salespeople who, actually, are only trying to help you and make a commission. In other words, it's unlikely that they'll give you a hard time.

Still, if you're easily cowed by situations where somebody else knows everything and you know very little, here are my best tips from years of working the other side (customer side) of the perfume counter.

• If you know a perfume by name and would like to smell it, ask the salesperson. This is a great way to start. Then you can comment on it. "It's too flowery!" or "I love this!" your salesperson can better guide you to what you are really looking for.
• You can smell the perfume out of the bottle, you can allow the sales person to give you a bit on your skin, or the salesperson can spray a paper strip. If you do the strip, let it dry before you smell it. Write down the name of the perfume on the paper. You keep that.
• Don't hesitate to ask about gift sets. For some reason, salespeople do not always bring them up, even when they have a fabulous offer.
• You can't really smell more than a few scents without getting nose confusion. Most salespeople have some coffee beans for you to sniff to "clear your nose." Ask for this, if you're not offered. (And the salesperson will probably think, "Wow, this person knows what they're doing!")
• If you know the scent you want, ask the sales person if there are lotions, shower gels, or other types of ways of the fragrance is packaged. Get her to show them to you and see if she recommends any. Most perfume salespeople love fragrance products so if a salesperson says she uses something all of the time or really loves a certain lotion, that's a very strong recommendation. (Figure it this way: she can use pretty much anything in her store, so she is likely to pick the very best of the best. If she's sincere and knowledgeable, that recommendation will tell you some of the best merchandise in the store.)
• Fragrance types include floral (or flowery--there's a difference but you don't need to know it here), Oriental (which is "heavier" and musky), Chypres (which is woodsy), spice (cinammon and friends), aldehyde (an "artificial" fragrance that is actually super appealing; Chanel No. 5 is this type), and then mixtures. You also hear words like "woody" or "vanilla" or "fruity" thrown in.
• You can also talk about perfume in terms of being light or heavy. The more perfumista language is daytime or nighttime (we wear lighter scents by day).
• Older perfumes are classics, not old lady perfumes. While some classics definitely have a nostalgic air to them, a few classics are timeless.
• Many of the newest perfumes have a light, after-shave type scent to them. These are great for teenagers and very young adults, but most mature women (like your mom) do not prefer them. Unless your mom specifically named a new scent or has tastes that you know put her in that arena, stay away from some of the "celebrity" or pop fragrances.

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