What’s that smell in the office?

When a friend told me JPMorgan had a “signature scent” wafting about its fancy new global headquarters on Park Avenue, I thought he was joking.

He was not, so I was less surprised when another friend said that on a recent trip to Goldman Sachs’s London offices, she was sure she had detected a whiff of Mojave Ghost.

This is a fragrance that a luxury goods outfit called Byredo sells for up to £390 (€455) a bottle and you can see why it might suit investment bankers.

Its makers describe it as an ode to the enduring spirit of the Mojave Desert, “where only the most resilient flowers can bloom amidst the vast, arid landscape”.

Ken Early: The World Cup is an epic battle between prudent precision and superhuman instinct

A dream house in Cavan: ‘If anyone thinks it’s too late to do something like this, it’s not’

Carmel’s Camino trek goes wrong: A disappearing driver and a €900 taxi ride

Sadly, I got a somewhat barren response when I asked Goldman if it was really using the stuff to perfume its premises. “We won’t have any guidance/comment to add here,” said the press office.

A JPMorgan spokesperson also declined to give me any more details about its customised fragrance, which is a shame because it turns out I have been way behind the eight ball on the bespoke scent situation.

Big companies across the world are now developing their own distinctive aromas, sometimes with lavish assistance.

Air France last year unleashed what it called a “comforting musky scent” on unsuspecting visitors to its airport lounges that was designed by a master perfumer named Francis Kurkdjian and aims to kindle “a feeling of space, calm and light”.

A more apt airport aroma would summon a sense of crush, dread and fury. But I admire Air France’s ambition, if not the name it came up with for its perfume: “AF001”.

That’s the flight number for the supersonic Concorde service the airline ran from Paris to New York – until it was retired in the wake of a crash in 2000 at Paris-Charles de Gaulle airport that killed everyone on board.

WeWork chose an equally curious name for the blend of “grounding patchouli” and “calming lavender” it decided to waft about its office spaces to set “a welcoming tone for meaningful connections”.

It’s called “Verdure”, a name I cannot see without thinking of other words ending in “ure” that evoke the steaming mess WeWork investors were left with as the former $47 billion (€41 billion) unicorn descended into bankruptcy.

Verdure was created exclusively by an Australian-founded group called Air Aroma that says its clients range from French champagne makers to upmarket car companies and high-end parka producers.

This is fine for luxury businesses. They exist in an industry with an unparalleled ability to extract cash from people who can afford to part with it.

It might also make sense for stores. Air Aroma claims its products “create memorable and emotionally resonant environments that attract customers, encourage longer visits and lead to increased spending”, which I can more or less imagine.

But I struggle to understand why other employers are bothering to drench their air diffusion systems with essential oils, no matter how expertly brewed.

Obviously, no one wants to breathe foul air at work, a hazard too many have faced when fated to sit beside an energetic unshowered cyclist, or one too many al desko stews.

It is sometimes claimed that fragrant air makes workers more calm, content and productive, which I am obviously all up for. But these claims often emanate from outfits linked to corporate scent marketers while others are based on research involving a small number of participants.

The effect of smells on workers is relatively understudied but larger analyses of what workers really want in an office show air odour tends to come well behind a host of other factors.

People really want to be able to make a phone call in private, or finish their work undisturbed by the babble of open-plan desk colleagues. They also prize office temperatures they can adjust at will, as opposed to being forced to freeze or swelter. And they really like outside views and natural light, a finding I can confirm after watching the extraordinary lengths grown men and women will go to in order to snag a desk 2ft closer to a window.

Air quality is obviously important, but in one large European study, odour ranked behind both fresh air and air that does not make you too sweaty or dry-eyed.

Ultimately, I look forward to being persuaded that floral, musky scents are a serious adornment to working life. In the meantime I suspect I will be quite happy without them. – Copyright The Financial Times