Can Scent Sell? A Growing Number of Retailers Seem to Think So

By Carolyn Shapiro
The Virginian-Pilot
December 21, 2006

Amid an array of futuristic phones and groovy holiday music piped overhead in the Verizon Wireless store on Military Highway, shoppers can catch a whiff of something unexpected.

What's that smell? It's sweet.

Chocolate.

It's not wafting from the small bowl of Hershey's Kisses on the front counter. The store's employees concoct it by spritzing a small bottle of concentrated chocolate scent around the counter and the display of Chocolate phones.

The phones, made by South Korean manufacturer LG Electronics, arrived in Verizon Wireless stores in August. Capitalizing on the flavorful name, the retailer decided to try something different.

The company's marketers were "trying to find ways to make this stand out," said John Johnson, a Verizon Wireless spokesman, "and to create an identity and an experience around using this device."

By adding aroma to the sights and sounds in its stores, including eight of 16 in Hampton Roads, Verizon Wireless joined a fast-growing movement toward scent marketing - an attempt to tap the sense of smell to sell goods and services. A retail industry that long ago mastered using visuals and music to lure consumers now hopes to reach their wallets through their noses.

"This is not a fad, and this is not a trend," said Doug Hope, founder of the annual GlobalShop retail design conference, which has hosted a series of scent marketing seminars. "It was really all about sound in the '90s, and now it's all about scent."

With its store-bought spray bottle, Verizon Wireless takes a low-tech approach. But companies today can choose from a variety of devices developed for the sole purpose of permeating their stores with a pleasant bouquet.

Some use it to promote a particular item, such as the Chocolate phone or a food or fragrance with a flavor or aroma that they want customers to experience. Nordstrom, for instance, has used scent machines in about two-thirds of its stores' cosmetics departments to highlight a perfume that's on special or an exclusive, said Brooke White, a spokeswoman at Nordstrom, which has a Norfolk store.

Busch Gardens in Williamsburg has used scent delivery systems to distribute a variety of aromas - from a minty Winter Blue to Lavender Vanilla - in its retail shops, said Murray Dameron, marketing manager for ScentAir Technologies Inc. The Charlotte, N.C., company developed a mix of evergreen called Noel for the German area of the European-themed park and Creamsicle for a children's retail store, Dameron says.

An increasing number of companies today aim to attach aroma to their brand identity. Think of it as an aromatic logo. Where Nike has its swoosh and Intel a signature sound, another company seeks to link its image to a scent.

Westin hotels, which will open a location late next year at Virginia Beach's Town Center, became the poster chain for this type of marketing by wafting a whiff of white tea though common areas.

Companies have used scents to enhance the appeal of products with no innate odor, such as Sony electronics and DeBeers diamonds.

As consumers grow numb to the myriad messages thrown at their eyes and ears, the sense of smell remains less explored by retailers.

"The marketers are running out of ways to target the customer. There's music blaring. There's signs everywhere," said Harald Vogt, founder and chief marketer of the Scent Marketing Institute, an association of scent-industry players. "You cannot shut down your nose, because we've all got to breathe."

Marketers also love smell because it's the sense most directly linked to emotions, said Rachel Herz, a visiting professor specializing in olfactory cognition and emotion at Brown University in Providence, R.I.

Although interest in scent marketing began more than a decade ago, the technology required time and research to make it adaptable and affordable. ScentAir sells the ScentWave, a machine about the size of a shoebox that uses a fan and a dry evaporative process to pass air over a surface "impregnated" with scent and circulate it over a wide area.

In addition to its simple spray, Verizon Wireless attached plastic strips coated with chocolate scent to the phone displays and a scented varnish to an information poster at the front counter of some stores, Johnson says.

Whether scent marketing works to stimulate sales remains hazy. Surveys of consumers have shown they will linger in an environment with an odor they like or choose to shop at a pleasant-smelling store, but they have yet to indicate a real boost to business.

Verizon Wireless has no data to show how the chocolate scent influenced sales of the Chocolate phone.

"The launch of this device was one of the most successful in our history in terms of speed and volume of sales," Johnson said, though, he adds, that might have more to do with the phone's functions.

Nonetheless, a salesman in the Verizon Wireless store in Suffolk swears by the chocolate smell, said Elizabeth Fairchild, the retailer's district manager for Hampton Roads. As a customer debated buying the Chocolate or another phone, the salesman spritzed the scent bottle behind her, unnoticed. She bought the Chocolate.

"It always works, " the salesman told Fairchild. "It just puts them in the mood for chocolate."

ScentAir Technologies Inc, founded in 2000, is the leading provider of aroma marketing solutions for brands and retailers. ScentAir enables businesses to create a unique in-store experience by engaging memory and emotions through patented scent delivery systems. Proven to enhance the appeal of any environment, these pioneering scent machines can be customized to reflect even the most challenging environment or brand. ScentAir is a privately held company located in Charlotte, NC.

For additional information contact Murray Dameron at 704-504-2320.