Inter Parfums Batch Codes: Year Letter + Julian Day
Montblanc, Jimmy Choo, Coach, Van Cleef & Arpels, Boucheron and Karl Lagerfeld fragrances share one licensed manufacturer — and one 9-character code.
5 min read · Updated July 2026
Anatomy of the code 08J38J169
| Characters | What they encode |
|---|---|
08 | Internal reference — no date information |
J | Production year, from a letter cycle that skips I and O — J = 2019 |
38J | Internal batch / line reference |
169 | Day of the year — day 169 is 18 June |
Worked examples
Decoded live by the same engine that powers the checker — not transcribed by hand.
08J38J169June 18, 2019medium confidenceThe verified reference code: 18 June 2019.
12M44K210July 29, 2022medium confidenceYear letter M, day 210.
Why so many unrelated brands share a code
Montblanc, Jimmy Choo, Coach, Van Cleef & Arpels, Boucheron, Karl Lagerfeld, Kate Spade, Ferragamo, Moncler, Guess, Abercrombie & Fitch and Dunhill have nothing in common as fashion houses. They have everything in common as fragrances: Inter Parfums holds the licence and manufactures all of them.
That is the single most useful fact about batch codes generally. The format follows the factory, not the logo on the bottle. If you know who actually makes a fragrance, you know how to read its code.
How the code is built
The code runs to about nine characters. The first letter in it is the production year, on an annual cycle that skips I and O — the two letters most easily misread as 1 and 0. That puts J at 2019, K at 2020, L at 2021, M at 2022, N at 2023, P at 2024, Q at 2025 and R at 2026.
The last three digits are the day of that year. Everything in between is internal batch and line reference, and can be ignored.
Reading one by hand
- Find the first letter. Count from J = 2019 forward, skipping I and O.
- Take the final three digits as the day of the year and convert: divide by 30.4 for a rough month.
- If the final three digits are over 366, this is not the day — on a minority of Inter Parfums codes those digits are a factory line. Treat the result as approximate in that case.
Where it's printed
Box base, and on a sticker or direct print on the underside of the bottle. Inter Parfums codes are usually printed in black on the white base sticker and are among the easier fragrance codes to read without a magnifier.
FAQ
Why skip I and O?
Because a stamped I is indistinguishable from a 1 and an O from a 0 on a low-contrast print. Several manufacturers — Creed among them — skip the same two letters for the same reason.
The last three digits give a date that seems wrong.
On some codes those digits are a line number, not a day. If the decoded date is implausible for the bottle, that is likely what happened. The year letter is the more reliable half of the code.
Brands that use this code (12)
The format belongs to the manufacturer, not the label on the bottle — every brand below is stamped by the same plants and reads the same way.
Other code formats
- Coty Batch Codes (YDDD): How to Read Them
- L'Oréal Batch Codes: The Year-Letter System Explained
- Estée Lauder Batch Codes: Plant, Month, Year in 3 Characters
- Dior, Chanel and LVMH Batch Codes: The Date Is in the Code
Not sure which code on the pack is the batch code? How to Find Your Batch Code