Innovative local finance: Beverly Hills edition

The city of Beverly Hills has decided to license it's name and famous brown shield to a perfume manufacturer. So now you can smell like Rodeo Drive. From the LA Times:

The city of Beverly Hills and its partners plan to unveil three city-licensed perfumes Tuesday at a coming-out gala. With names like "Must Have" and "Iconic," the $120-a-bottle fragrances will feature the city's name and famous brown shield logo.

Retail sales will begin in department stores in January, and if all goes well, an entire line of Beverly Hills-themed scents and skin care products will roll out in the next year or so.

But don't worry. The land of high-end boutiques, celebrity sightings and five-star eateries isn't going bankrupt. An estimated $100,000 a year in royalties raised by the unusual licensing partnership will be pumped into the city's marketing department.

And:

The perfumes were formulated in Switzerland, each characterizing an aspect of the Beverly Hills lifestyle, Walsh said.

When I was a grad student in LA, I lived in Beverly Hills and rode my bike everywhere. I wonder if that aspect of the Beverly Hills lifestyle is captured in a bottle.