As days get longer and temperatures rise, students ditch jeans for shorts, coats for cutoffs, and soap for sweat. Strolling around campus, one can experience a myriad of aromas ranging from pleasant to putrid. However, the rising temperatures seem to have sparked a new fad of staying soap-free and all natural.

 The mingling scents of sweat and stale body odor seem to follow wherever students go. In classrooms, hallways, apartments, and dorms, nobody can escape this growing trend. Even many professors, who have some of the highest levels of education in the country and are paid well enough to have soap and running water, seem to be susceptible to this new fragrance. 

Of the two potential explanations for this change- laziness and trendiness- only one is plausible. On a campus filled with the future leaders of tomorrow, I am led to believe that the desire to set new trends is the culprit for this new change. Furthermore, popular cologne brands such as Giorgio Armani and Montblanc have been receiving submissions from Carlson School students trying to capitalize on the new trend. 

Whether by submitting ideas to major companies for potential partnerships, or by creating a new company centered around the musty trend, Carlson’s business-minded students are doing their best to “leave the nine-to-five rat race” and get their big break. Students have been taking the trend to the extreme in an attempt to show that they started the trend or are the most passionate about it. They have been handing out sample bottles of sweat wrung from their gym shirts and the clothes worn to their many interviews. Wearing trash bags and sweat-suits to maximize their sweat output and thus their cologne production, Carlson students seem to be the primary cause of the trend’s growth.

In the coming months, as more students join the trend, the fragrance will spread across the entire campus. Students should expect to see hopeful entrepreneurs setting up stands outside of Coffman and at both ends of the Washington Avenue bridge in the hopes that their superior business knowledge will allow them to become the leading fragrance influencer on campus.