Must smell my products

Does anyone else have to smell their beauty products before buying them, lol? I open everything and smell it before I buy it, if it smells bad I won't buy it (regardless of how great reviews may be).
- A Target just opened up across the street from my house ( there goes my pay check), so today I went to go check it out. I swear I was in the hair care section for an 30 min just smelling different products. People were looking at me like I was crazy, but I didnt care. If I'm gonna spend my money on a product I want to know how it smells, lol. I noticed that they had "Yes to Cucumbers" and "Yes to Carrots". This peaked my interest b/c of Curly Nikki's rave reviews. I picked up the bottle to open it up and take a sniff, and realized it was sealed. I was SO disappointed and irritated that I couldn't smell this stuff. The PJ in me really wanted to buy it, but I refused to because I couldn't get a preview wiff, lol. I instead got a cheap bottle of Suave Smooth (which smells fantastic). Just thought I'd share my patheticness (is that a word?) with other product junkies.

P.S. I'm loving Suave products lately. I would never buy it before because I always assumed it was low quality b/c of the price. I tried several Suave conditioners after reading reviews on here. I've ventured out and started buying their lotion, body wash, and deodorant and I am pleased with them all!

I don't blame you. No one wants to smell something that's nasty on their head all day.

Just so you know Yes to Carrot/Cucumbers just smell like a generic lotion IMO. Clean and simple, but nothing special.

Yes ma'am! I have to smell everything that goes on my hair or body. I haven't bought the YTC yet, but I smelled them anyway [You must be registered and logged in to see this image.] And I agree with you about the Suave products. I recently bought the Tropical coconut conditioner that everyone raves about and I love it! I love it for cowashing and as a leave-in.

I'm big on smells too. But I LOVE the smell of Yes to Cucumbers. I didn't like the Yes to Carrots smell though. So I guess to each his own.

As they say, the nose knows! I have been this way ever since I was a child. Walking through perfume departments, the smell of new carpet or freshly sprayed cologne or hairspray - they all overwhelm me. For that reason I've stayed away from anything with non-natural fragrance or bought fragrance-free for years. But we should be thankful our bodies are sounding the alarm bells.

Recent studies and news reports have validated why my body's reaction, because ultimately those strong fragrances aren't great for our health. Companies aren't required to indicate the ingredients that go into the vague ingredient 'Fragrance', hence there are many synthetic ingredients that have adverse effects but are difficult to pinpoint due to the poor labeling. Try googling "phthalate fragrance" and you will find out about just one of the harmful chemicals used to help make fragrances stronger and long-lasting, but which can impact fertility among other things. This article provides a summary of all the products in which perfumes are used that you might not even think of and illustrates how all these fragrances cumulatively can have a negative impact. It doesn't have references, but you can search for other more recent articles that detail the different chemicals. It's a bit scary. http://www.naturalnews.com/001061.html

I think some of this is driven by us - certain synthetic fragrances seem "fresh" or "clean" smelling to us, so the longer this smell lingers, or the stronger it is, the better. And if we smell natural body odors we are conditioned to think of this as dirty, but in some respects this is healthier than masking natural smells with toxic ones. Think about stereotypes of French people versus U.S. citizens: who is smellier, who is healthier?

I say go beyond smelling the product, and read the label. If it says 'fragrance' then perhaps it's better to pass it up completely. Essential oils can still be strong so smell those, but at least you know then that they're strong and natural, not strong and poisonous.

I am the same way OP! Smell is everything and I just recently got disappointed b/c I bought some Curl Junkie product from curlmart and the smell is horrible!!! Wayyyyyy to much lavender oil. I couldn't figure out what is what that I dind't like about the scent but I knew it was some type of EO. Sure enough I looked at the label and lavender oil was one of the ingredients! Yuck, I'm made b/c I don't wanna deal with the hassle of returning it. And usually lavender is no problem for me but this is overkill. Maybe I'll have to give it away.

Gado-Gado Gal that link is eye opening to say the very least. I'm learning so much!

OP-
You are not alone. Truly would have passed on the Aubrey Organics JAY Shampoo if I could have gotten a whiff before I bought it. Very "earthy" aroma. It works really well and the "fragrance" doesn't linger after rinse-out & conditioning.
With Yes To products just take the large white cap off and unscrew the little cap and you can smell it. The printed cap cover is designed to look like a seal but it isn't.

Lawd!! I should have smelled that Carols Daughter leave-in spray a little longer before I purchased it yesterday!! I suspect that I will definately be giving that one away...YUCK!! I think it's the Khoret Amen scent or something like that. Smells like wood.