I can't recycle the bottles, the perfume loses its scent over the years, and there's just too much for me to use normally. Do you guys have any experience using old perfume/cologne for purposes other than smelling good? Googling this topic has gotten me nowhere, so I figured I'd try here for alternative, and possibly survival-related uses.

Could I use it as a firestarter or something? Or would the chemicals be too volatile, or not volatile enough?

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

you can use it as a fire starter but do you really want to carry a heavy set glass bottle around? You can't really soak anything in old perfume either and store it for later use since alcohol evaporates very quickly. If you have no alcohol wipes available you can probably use it as a substitute disinfectant if you don't mind the stink...

The best way to test if it's potent or not... go outside spray some onto aluminum foil and put match to it... if it burns it works... fumes may be a bit toxic or unpleasant.

Personally I would just throw it away. I know we should recycle everything and come up with home solutions but few alcohol wipes would serve the same purpose.

I've been told that the "sell by" shelf life of good perfume is considered to be about 6 months by the manufacturers. That must mean that a lot of perfume gets pulled off shelves and disposed of somehow.

Around the house, I'm wondering if old perfume couldn't be used to discourage insects and other pests around your property. I've heard that mothballs in flower beds will keep even snakes away. (don't know how true that may be.)

As a test, you might try soaking something (cotton balls) in some of the perfume and putting them in an ant bed and seeing what the reaction would be.

Bath for dirty/smelly dog ?

Dave

Some folks will drink even that.....

I wish you could reuse the spray bottles