Why are there coffee beans in perfume shops?

They're olfactory palate cleansers; smelling the same notes over and over, as you do when fragrance testing, overwhelms your sense of smell (olfactory fatigue), making you temporarily nose-blind. Coffee beans recallibrate your sense of smell - a quick sniff of coffee beans and you should be straight back on smelling form. read more

The odor of coffee is one way perfume shops have of “clearing the palate” for those who wish to sniff a fragrance before purchasing it. At best, this is a very imperfect way to sample a fragrance. read more

Smelling coffee aroma between perfume samples, as compared to smelling unscented air, actually works. The perceived odor intensity of the perfume from sample to sample stayed the same after smelling coffee aroma while it decreased when smelling air between samples. read more

Except all of that is Perfume Myth of the highest degree as the nature of olfactory fatigue and whether coffee beans have any effect on the supposed saturation of your smell receptors is just nonsense. read more