Help and enquiries

A list of IFRA mem­bers can be found on the Mem­bership web­pa­ge. The­se inclu­de the FRA’s Regu­lar and Sup­por­ting members.

Plea­se con­tact the rele­vant IFRA Natio­nal Asso­cia­tion for infor­ma­tion on fra­gran­ce hou­ses in a par­ti­cu­lar country which are mem­ber of that Natio­nal Association.

Mem­bers of IFRA Natio­nal Asso­cia­tions can request a let­ter to con­firm their affi­lia­tion to IFRA and their adhe­ren­ce to the IFRA Code of Prac­ti­ce and the IFRA Stan­dards. They can send their request via the con­tact form on this website.

IFRA can­not pro­vi­de such let­ter to non-IFRA members.

The­re are seve­ral offi­cial cour­ses for per­fu­mery in the world and con­se­quently it can be a dif­fi­cult industry to break into it so we sug­gest to do an own onli­ne search.

Some exam­ples are:

• Ins­ti­tu­te Supé­rieur Inter­na­tio­nal du Par­fum de la Cos­mé­ti­que et de l’Aromatique Ali­men­tai­re (ISIP­CA), loca­ted in Ver­sai­lles, Fran­ce. This most renow­ned inde­pen­dent school of per­fu­mery ins­ti­tu­te runs a ran­ge of cour­ses rela­ted to the fra­gran­ce industry from per­fu­mery to eva­lua­tion and marketing.
• Gras­se Ins­ti­tu­te of Per­fu­mery (GIP), foun­ded by the IFRA Natio­nal Asso­cia­tion in Fran­ce, Pro­da­rom. GIP is a pres­ti­gious school loca­ted in Gras­se, France.
• Some per­fu­mery schools are run pri­va­tely by some of the lar­ge fra­gran­ce hou­ses and are used to train futu­re employees.
• Inter­na­tio­nal Cen­tre for Aro­ma Tra­de Stu­dies (ICATS) is an orga­ni­za­tion that exists to pro­vi­de fle­xi­ble qua­lity lear­ning to pro­fes­sio­nals and aspi­ring tho­se pro­fes­sio­nals in the Aro­ma Tra­des, Per­fu­mery and Fla­vor indus­tries. ICATS offers the IFEAT Gra­dua­te Diplo­ma or Cer­ti­fi­ca­te accre­di­ted by the Inter­na­tio­nal Fede­ra­tion of Essen­tial Oils and Aro­ma Tra­des (IFEAT).

IFRA does not pro­vi­de per­fu­mery courses.

The IFRA Trans­pa­rency List is the​‘perfumer’s palet­te’ – an over­view of the ingre­dients used to crea­te fra­gran­ce mix­tu­res emplo­yed by con­su­mer goods com­pa­nies in per­so­nal care pro­ducts, home care pro­ducts and fine fra­gran­ce worldwide.

The IFRA Trans­pa­rency List is based on repor­ting anony­mous and con­fi­den­tially pro­vi­ded by IFRA Mem­bers in the ​‘Volu­me of Use Sur­vey’, which is com­pi­led every five years.

For the prin­ci­pal name of the ingre­dients, the RIFM Prin­ci­pal name is the most ​“com­monly known by” synonym though they may also be some che­mi­cal or INCI names.

The current List inclu­des a new, more refi­ned nomen­cla­tu­re sys­tem for natu­ral pro­ducts. The­se pro­ducts can have various geo­graphi­cal ori­gins, be extrac­ted via dif­fe­rent pro­ces­ses, and come from dif­fe­rent parts of the plant.

We the­re­fo­re employ a sys­tem that pro­vi­des grea­ter detail and trans­pa­rency than the Che­mi­cal Abs­tracts Ser­vi­ce (CAS) num­ber sys­tem.

As sta­ted by the IFRA NCS task­for­ce docu­ment date 23 January 2025, the­re is a com­mon per­cep­tion that ​“natu­ral” holds par­ti­cu­lar sig­ni­fi­can­ce, promp­ting the fra­gran­ce industry to address the need for a clear defi­ni­tion of what cons­ti­tu­tes a natu­ral fra­gran­ce ingredient.

In the dic­tio­nary, the term ​“natu­ral” is defi­ned as exis­ting in or deri­ved by natu­re. It is impor­tant to stress that within the fra­gran­ce industry, the­re is no offi­cial defi­ni­tion and that ​“natu­ral” can be defi­ned in dif­fe­rent ways depen­ding, for ins­tan­ce, upon the geo­graphi­cal area. Each con­su­mer pro­duct manu­fac­tu­rer is ulti­ma­tely res­pon­si­ble for the way in which the con­su­mer pro­duct is des­cri­bed or promoted.

In cases whe­re the manu­fac­tu­rer does not give clear ins­truc­tions and gui­de­li­nes to its fra­gran­ce sup­plier, the fra­gran­ce sup­plier can use the follo­wing defi­ni­tion and posi­tions sup­por­ted by the Inter­na­tio­nal Fra­gran­ce Asso­cia­tion (IFRA):

1. . Only aro­ma­tic raw mate­rials mat­ching with the terms and defi­ni­tions laid down in the ISO 92351 can be used in fra­gran­ce mix­tu­res clai­med as ​“natu­ral”. Note: this can inclu­de raw mate­rials further sub-cate­go­ri­zed (e.g., 2.1.2 Abso­lu­te x‑less) and sup­ple­men­tary cate­go­ries added based on expert review (e.g., 2.54 Sol­vent extrac­tion of dis­ti­lla­tion water). The com­ple­te list of terms is avai­la­ble on the IFRA website.
2. Exam­ples of raw mate­rials that can­not be used in fra­gran­ce mix­tu­res clai­med as ​“natu­ral” are synthe­tic mole­cu­les, recons­ti­tu­ted essen­tial oils invol­ving the addi­tion of synthe­tic mole­cu­les and che­mi­cally modi­fied natu­ral raw mate­rials (e.g., acety­la­ted veti­ver oil).
3. The pro­duc­tion method of cer­tain natu­ral ingre­dients and the sta­bi­lity of such ingre­dients may requi­re the addi­tion of synthe­tic ingre­dients (e.g., sol­vents). This is further defi­ned by IFRA, so that the con­su­mer pro­duct manu­fac­tu­rer may deter­mi­ne if the natu­ral­ness cri­te­ria are met:
   1. • Small quan­ti­ties of anti­oxi­dants or pre­ser­va­ti­ves may be added to pro­tect aro­ma­tic natu­ral raw mate­rials (as defi­ned in the ISO 9235)
      from degra­da­tion.
   2. • In cases whe­re synthe­tic sol­vents are used for pro­duc­tion pro­cess reasons, they should be remo­ved to the grea­test pos­si­ble extent per GMP requirements
   3. • In cases whe­re dilu­tion sol­vents are used in the fra­gran­ce mix­tu­re clai­med as ​“natu­ral”, it is requi­red to use dilu­tion sol­vents coming exclu­si­vely from bio­lo­gi­cal sour­ces (bio-sour­ced ingre­dients and not petro­che­mi­cal sources).

IFRA does not issue Cer­ti­fi­ca­tes of Con­for­mity for the use of the IFRA Stan­dards or any other form of cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, and no cer­tif­ying com­pany is autho­ri­zed to pro­vi­de Cer­ti­fi­ca­tes of Con­for­mity on behalf of IFRA. The­re­fo­re, it is unautho­ri­zed to make any sta­te­ments regar­ding IFRA cer­ti­fi­ca­tion that could be mis­lea­ding. Further­mo­re, the IFRA Bylaws and our bran­ding gui­de­li­nes clearly sta­te that ​“no com­pany may use the IFRA logo without prior writ­ten authorization”.

In addi­tion, the IFRA Bylaws and IFRA brand gui­de­li­nes prohi­bit the use of the logo in any way that implies IFRA cer­ti­fies indi­vi­dual pro­ducts, raw mate­rials, or for­mu­la­tions. IFRA does not cer­tify pro­ducts or grant licen­ses for pro­mo­tio­nal use of its name or logo. Any such impli­ca­tion is mis­lea­ding to con­su­mers and the mar­ket­pla­ce”.