FINE FRAGRANCE CREATIVE EVALUATOR – MIDDLE EAST

Palomba General Trading; Dubai; Hybrid; AED 223,000 - 357,000; Full time

Job summary

Palomba General Trading LLC is seeking an experienced Fine Fragrance Creative Evaluator – Middle East to support premium and niche fragrance concept development for GCC and international markets. The role requires strong olfactory judgement and ability to translate briefs into technical feedback for perfumers.

Based in Dubai, the position involves evaluating submissions, developing briefs, benchmarking against references, and guiding fragrance development with perfumers.

Qualifications

• Minimum 5 years of relevant fragrance evaluation/development experience preferred.
• Strong olfactory vocabulary.
• Knowledge of fragrance families and raw materials.

Responsibilities

• Evaluate fine-fragrance submissions and modifications.
• Develop and interpret olfactory briefs.
• Translate creative objectives into structured perfumer feedback.
• Compare competing fragrance directions.
• Conduct benchmarking against relevant market references.
• Assess top, heart and dry-down development.
• Evaluate diffusion, persistence, balance and identity.
• Participate in fragrance-selection sessions.
• Guide modification rounds with perfumers.
• Evaluate natural and synthetic raw materials.
• Support development of GCC-oriented fragrance concepts.
• Analyse consumer and market olfactory trends.
• Support premium and niche fragrance-development projects.
• Work with essential oils, naturals and specialty aromatic ingredients.
• Participate in customer presentations and technical fragrance discussions.
• Maintain structured evaluation records.
• Support selection of final fragrance candidates.

Skills

Fragrance evaluation

Olfactory terminology

Perfumer collaboration

Fragrance briefs

Market trend analysis

Job description

FINE FRAGRANCE CREATIVE EVALUATOR – MIDDLE EAST

Location: Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Employment type: Full-time

Workplace: On-site / Hybrid depending on profile

Indicative salary: AED 20,000–32,000 per month + performance component

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Palomba General Trading LLC is seeking an experienced Fine Fragrance Creative Evaluator – Middle East to support the development of premium and niche fragrance concepts for the GCC and international markets.

This role is designed for a professional with strong olfactory judgement who can work between:

• perfumers;
• fragrance houses;
• raw-material suppliers;
• product-development teams;
• commercial teams;
• premium fragrance brands.

This is not a conventional sales, QC or perfume-retail position.

The successful candidate must be capable of evaluating fragrance compositions professionally, translating creative briefs into meaningful technical feedback and guiding successive modifications toward a commercially strong final fragrance.

• Evaluate fine-fragrance submissions and modifications.
• Develop and interpret olfactory briefs.
• Translate creative objectives into structured perfumer feedback.
• Compare competing fragrance directions.
• Conduct benchmarking against relevant market references.
• Assess top, heart and dry-down development.
• Evaluate diffusion, persistence, balance and identity.
• Participate in fragrance-selection sessions.
• Guide modification rounds with perfumers.
• Evaluate natural and synthetic raw materials.
• Support development of GCC-oriented fragrance concepts.
• Analyse consumer and market olfactory trends.
• Support premium and niche fragrance-development projects.
• Work with essential oils, naturals and specialty aromatic ingredients.
• Participate in customer presentations and technical fragrance discussions.
• Maintain structured evaluation records.
• Support selection of final fragrance candidates.

Strong familiarity with Middle Eastern fragrance preferences is highly valuable.

Relevant experience may include:

• oud;
• amber;
• musks;
• saffron;
• incense;
• rose;
• woods;
• leather;
• gourmand structures;
• oriental accords;
• high-performance fragrance profiles.

However, the role is not limited to traditional Middle Eastern perfumery.

The objective is to combine regional relevance with contemporary international fine fragrance.

Candidates should be comfortable assessing:

• opening impact;
• evolution;
• heart structure;
• dry-down;
• diffusion;
• substantivity;
• harmony;
• complexity;
• differentiation;
• consumer relevance.

The candidate should be able to explain why one modification is stronger than another rather than simply stating that one “smells better”.

Knowledge of fragrance raw materials is important.

Relevant familiarity may include:

• essential oils;
• absolutes;
• resinoids;
• isolates;
• aroma chemicals;
• captive-style technologies;
• specialty natural extracts.

Particular interest in candidates capable of evaluating high-quality natural materials.

The role may convert ideas such as:

• modern oud;
• transparent amber;
• mineral rose;
• contemporary incense;
• citrus-wood;
• sensual musk;
• luxury gourmand

into structured olfactory briefs that a perfumer can actually work with.

Relevant backgrounds may include:

• Fine Fragrance Evaluator
• Senior Fragrance Evaluator
• Fragrance Development Manager
• Creative Fragrance Developer
• Fragrance Evaluation Manager
• Junior Perfumer with strong evaluation experience

Particularly relevant experience from:

• Givaudan
• dsm-firmenich
• IFF
• Mane
• Robertet
• Symrise
• Iberchem
• Eurofragance
• Sozio
• CPL Aromas
• EP Parfums
• comparable fragrance houses

• Minimum 5 years of relevant fragrance evaluation/development experience preferred.
• Direct professional experience evaluating fine fragrances.
• Strong olfactory vocabulary.
• Knowledge of fragrance families and raw materials.
• Ability to benchmark competitive fragrances.
• Experience working directly with perfumers.
• Experience developing fragrance briefs.
• Strong written and verbal communication.
• Excellent English.
• Arabic or French is advantageous.
• Middle East market exposure strongly preferred.

Full-time position based in Dubai.

Indicative salary:

AED 20,000–32,000 per month

depending on direct fragrance-industry experience and seniority.

The role provides direct involvement in new fine-fragrance projects, international raw-material sourcing and development of fragrance concepts for Middle Eastern and international markets.

Palomba General Trading LLC is a Dubai-based international business-development and trading company active across natural ingredients, botanical extracts, essential oils, flavours, fragrances and specialty raw materials.

PGT works with international producers and customers across Europe, the GCC and other selected markets.

The company is expanding its fragrance-development capabilities to support new premium and technically differentiated projects.