Buying Cheaper Perfume: Price per ml, Sizes, Vouchers and Cashback Compared

Why the Sticker Price Alone Can Mislead You

Two shops, two prices, but two different bottle sizes, a voucher here, cashback there. If you actually want to buy perfume for less, you cannot rely on the plain price alone. Only once you add up all of these factors do you know which offer is genuinely the better one.

Price per ml as a Common Measure

The simplest way to fairly compare two differently sized bottles is price per millilitre: total price divided by the volume. A 100 ml bottle for 89 euros and a 50 ml bottle for 52 euros look similar at first glance, but per ml the larger bottle is noticeably cheaper. Fixed costs like the bottle itself, packaging, and filling spread across more millilitres in a larger size, which is why bigger sizes are almost always the better deal.

A Real Example With Price per ml

Here is what that looks like with an actual, current offer, including price per ml:

Price per ml is what turns two differently sized bottles into genuinely comparable numbers.

Vouchers: Only the Actual Deduction Counts

A voucher only really lowers the price if it applies to the fragrance you want and the order total you are placing. Minimum order values, excluded brands, or an expiry date can mean a code does not actually apply at checkout. What matters is not the discount percentage printed on the code, but the price that remains after the voucher is deducted, together with shipping, customs duty, and import tax where those apply to a particular offer.

Cashback: The Extra, Not the Starting Point

Cashback comes on top of the purchase itself, usually as a percentage of the order value that gets paid back to you afterwards. Unlike a voucher, cashback does not lower the price at checkout, it arrives later instead. For a fair comparison between two shops, the total price after voucher, shipping, customs duty, and import tax comes first, cashback is the additional benefit on top that is worth looking at separately.

Putting All the Pieces Together

A genuinely fair comparison between two offers takes into account: the price after any voucher that reliably applies, the price per ml across different sizes, shipping costs, import VAT and possible customs duty for shops outside the EU, and only after that, any cashback as an additional plus. On our fragrance pages, this calculation is shown right next to every offer, so you do not need to work it out yourself.

Frequently Asked Questions