Scent Meets Smoothie: DedCool Breaks the Beauty Mold
Carina Chaz didn’t set out to disrupt the fragrance industry; she just wanted to make something that felt like her. What began as a humble passion project and shared through a small Instagram following, has since evolved into one of the most viral fragrance brands on the market: DedCool.
“I was raised in a beauty lab,” Chaz shares. “My mom had her own beauty manufacturing lab, so I grew up watching formulas come to life. That’s where my passion for scent started. I was obsessed.”
Founded in 2016 in Los Angeles when Chaz was just 21, DedCool started as a side hustle rooted in clean beauty, personal identity, and a rebellious desire to reimagine how fragrance could live in the real world. She has gone on to be named a Forbes 30 Under 30, in 2023.
The brand launched with genderless, vegan, cruelty-free, and non-toxic fragrances that broke traditional perfume rules. Chaz was blending fragrance with her own sense of irreverence: inspired by cologne, her love of masculine notes, and a desire to make scent feel more personal and less precious.
“There was no world where I thought DedCool could grow to the scale we’re at today — and I’m still pinching myself,” she says. “It started humbly on Instagram, and then grew to knocking on the doors of local retail shops with the hope of being carried on consignment.”
That door-knocking led to milestones that shaped the brand’s cult trajectory: In 2018, DedCool was picked up by Barneys New York, positioned next to top luxury fragrance houses, but at a more accessible price point. In 2022, it launched in Sephora, marking the beauty retailer’s first foray into categories like air fresheners and laundry detergent.
This summer, DedCool flipped the script on scent even more, by proving that the brand could take a beloved fragrance from spritz to sip: a smoothie with Erewhon was launched.
DedCool became the first-ever functional fragrance to turn into a beverage, with its debut smoothie inspired by the brand’s cult-favorite, nostalgic Milk scent. The “Xtra Milk Smoothie” is a functional blend available across all Erewhon locations in Los Angeles County until September.
“I’ve been obsessed with the idea of fragrance being more than something you spritz on. Xtra Milk is one of our most-loved scents because it’s so comforting and cozy, and I thought, what if you could taste that? It started as a wild idea, and Erewhon was the perfect partner to help bring it to life.” (Erewhon is also a DedCool retail partner.)
“We’re always trying to create a full sensory experience,” Chaz shares. “We leaned into ingredients that felt creamy, dreamy, and just a little bit nostalgic like coconut milk, banana, cardamom. I wanted it to feel like a hug in beverage form.”
A collaboration with Erewhon is a power move that expands DedCool’s reach beyond traditional beauty and into lifestyle, proving that scent doesn’t have to live in a bottle: it can live anywhere and be part of the zeitgeist.
(For context: Hailey Bieber’s “Strawberry Glaze” smoothie reportedly sells over 40,000 units per month — proving that these blends can go beyond buzz and become cultural bestsellers.
For DedCool, this smoothie isn’t about chasing virality. It’s about experiential fragrance — and building a world where scent isn’t limited to your wrist or neck, but woven into your daily rituals.
“For us, success looks like resonance,” Chaz continues. “Are people talking about it? Are they intrigued, maybe even slightly confused in the best way? That’s our sweet spot. We want to expand the idea of what a fragrance brand can be.”
It’s about brand-building and the notion of fragrance as a powerful form of self-expression. It’s also a way to create curiosity and conversation.
“Fragrance was ripe for transformation,” Chaz explains. “The rigid gender roles that the fragrance industry has profited off of for decades was begging for modernization. DedCool offers a solution to that because a kaleidoscope of diversity is already present within the DedCool community.”
While other brands analyze the data, DedCool leads with instinct. “We have internal gut checkers. We want to ensure our community knows we’re listening.”
From fine fragrance to Dedtergent (scented laundry detergent) and air fresheners, DedCool is launching products nobody asked for — on purpose. “There’s the laundry detergent nobody asked for, which we made anyway,” she says.
That blend of gut instinct and feedback loop with its community is part of what makes DedCool resonate so deeply with Gen Z and millennials. “Fragrance is so personal. I wanted people to be able to layer, play and make it theirs,” says Chaz.
That’s why DedCool launched with scents that were designed to be worn solo or layered, something she wasn’t seeing in traditional fragrance. The brand has become a TikTok favorite, with users raving about Taunt and Milk, and their layering-friendly profiles. But it’s not just hype. It’s about making fine fragrance fun and functional.
“We believe everyone should have a signature scent that extends beyond a glass bottle,” Chaz says. DedCool intermingles fragrance into otherwise mundane and “unsexy” products, from laundry detergent to car and air fresheners, and even poop drops.
Collaborations with brands that Chaz is personally obsessed with, like Starface, Deux, Ouai, and Youth to the People have only amplified the brand’s ethos: irreverent and sensorial. “When we work on collaborations, we always want to ensure the brand shares our values and ethos,” says Chaz.
Leaning into gut and instinct over data is working: DedCool grew over 400% from 2021 to 2022, and that momentum hasn’t slowed.
The future? More surprise drops, and yes, more things no one asked for. “I don’t think we’ve even scratched the surface yet. It’s exciting, and it still feels like we’re just getting started.” Chaz adds. “We have more unexpected ways to experience scent, more reasons to make fragrance part of your daily ritual. That’s all I’ll say for now. But it’s going to be cool.”
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