The Coty Toboggan presentation, introduced in 1940, is one of the company’s most charming and imaginative novelty sets. It features four miniature square perfume bottles, each fitted with the distinctive fish-scale frosted glass stoppers originally created for Coty’s Louvre presentations. Each bottle stands about 1⅝ inches tall and is secured to a wooden toboggan with gold-plated clips. The sled measures approximately 8.75 inches in length, with its gracefully curved front crafted from a lightweight, delicate early plastic.
The set includes four Coty classics: Emeraude, the rare Styx, the romantic L’Aimant, and the original Paris. Together, they form a playful, streamlined display described at the time as “four smart perfumes in a little toboggan.”
When the toboggan was first produced in 1940, it was made entirely from non-priority materials such as wood and plastics—a necessary adaptation during wartime, when metals and other strategic resources were reserved for defense production. The presentation returned after the war; Coty’s 1946 advertising celebrated it as a festive gift, noting that the “thrills and excitement of holiday festivity ride along with four bottles of exquisite perfume: Emeraude, L’Aimant, L’Origan, ‘Paris.’”
By 1948, Coty included the toboggan in a substantial Christmas lineup of nearly fifty gift items, which also featured ski sets holding Coty flacons. However, by 1951 Modern Packaging reported that while Coty’s popular Christmas bell packages would continue, the ski and toboggan presentations would not return, suggesting they had been overshadowed by newer, more successful designs.
Today, the Toboggan presentation stands as a delightful example of Coty’s inventive mid-century gift packaging and its ability to turn even small perfume bottles into a spirited holiday display.
