Put Your Hands Up – Sniffer At Work!

Hate that morning alarm buzzing in your ears? Think your job stinks? Be sure you will love your job after reading this.

A business card is always shown the respect it deserves and is a reflection of professionalism. What if the business card reads “Armpit Sniffers?”

This job entails sniffing armpits of people of all sizes, who stand in a line with their arms in the air. These people work as testers for deodorant manufacturing companies.

The cosmetic industry goes to great lengths to make sure people smell good after using their product and towards this end employs hundreds of armpit sniffers. The effectiveness of both antiperspirants and deodorants is still tested in the old fashioned way, using the power of the human nose. Men and women are tested in simulated hot room conditions, in order to understand the science of sweating.

Deodorant companies totally rely on these people to test their products and thanks to the work of these brave sniffers; consumers can come up smelling good. They protect us from the front lines in the battle with sweat and odor, as they sniff and probe thousands of armpits each year. A single sniffer is said to sniff around 60 armpits an hour and they take three sniffs per pit to assess the intensity of the body odor, all the while using their clipboards to note down offensive odors on a scale of 1 to 10.

There is an established protocol to perform this testing and it is done in three successive phases. The sniffers’ skill in detecting smell should not be dulled by cigarettes, coffee, cigarettes or other odorous substances. This data from the studies performed through sensory assessment is used to formulate effective products for both men and women, which offer wetness and odor protection.

The panelists on whom the deodorant or antiperspirant is tested can be all women, men or both, depending on the product being tested. Usually women sniffers are used to test products for men. During a recent scientific research, women sniffers have been used to determine that women are more drawn to the odor of men who are genetically dissimilar to them.

The fact that humans are one of the sweatiest species on our planet does not deter these people from working on this job, which is considered intolerable by many. This is certainly worthy of developing a new sense of respect for this job.

Professional sniffers are well trained to understand everything about the human body and the role of the sweat glands. One professional sniffer advices that it is important to stay hydrated and drink plenty of fluids to make sure the body’s sweat glands are replenished and the odor of the sweat does not come out too strong.

What deodorant companies can do is to make this job sound better by probably calling them, “sniffologists” or something similar. On a lighter note, when asked how it feels to be an armpit sniffer, the reply from a professional was, “if you’ve sniffed one, you’ve sniffed them all.”