When we are looking for employee growth, we’ll often joke that one of the perks of the job is that you get to smell the “new Mac smell” on a daily basis. It’s a great smell. (Don’t lie and say you don’t give your new Apple products a big sniff when you open them up.) I always figured it was just part of the manufacturing and packaging, but John Gruber writes that it is all part of the planned experience. That may be true, but for the record, Mac minis have a better aroma than the Mac Pros. (Perhaps they don’t have the sniff inspectors as well trained in the Texas manufacturing plant.) 

Well, twelve south decided to go and ruin our competitive advantage for hiring with that perk. This week, they started offering the “New Mac Candle”,  a hand poured Soy Wax candle that is supposed to mimic the new Mac smell. We ordered one right away so we could put it to the test with our expert sniffers. Dare I say, our “super sniffers.”

We open piles of new Macs everyday. We’ll put our expert sniffers on this product from @twelvesouth and report back. https://t.co/WvV0LxF8Tn — MacStadium (@MacStadium) October 3, 2016

Well, the candle has arrived. Here are some photos:

When the secretary brought the package to me, she asked if this box had a "new Mac" in it that was actually this small. A new Mac? I told her that was funny. 

Here are a couple photos of the candle, and also the label on the bottom:

And finally, the candle opened with an iPhone 7 placed next to it for size comparison:

It definitely smells good but I've sniffed a lot of ports in my day. (What? It's legal in Nevada.) I can't imagine how hard this was to pinpoint. I'm sure there was a lot of trial and error. On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd give it an accuracy score of 9. There is probably more citrus then I'd expect (after all, an apple is not a citrus fruit) but you can smell the Mac in there as well. I like it. 

And let's be honest, this is a great thing to have on the counter or shelf, especially at a Mac-focused shop like our data centers. It's going to make for some fun conversations. 

Twelve South is a great company that is a real member of the Mac community. They make great, high quality products. I'm glad they went and did what we all have said we'd like to do at some point. The candle is currently out of stock, but when they have more, you can find them here.