Chef Emeril Lagase always bemoans the lack of “smellavision” as he stirs some tasty looking dish. He knows that just one whiff will start us salivating and craving a bite. Wether it’s a pot of coffee brewing, a resiny Christmas tree or your mom’s brisket, our oldest and most primitive scent is deeply rooted in memory and can be highly motivating.

Spencer Morgan writes about scent branding as the newest craze in the fragrance industry in a recent article in Bloomberg Business Week. Fascinating. Read it here:
www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_26/b4184085987358.htm()

From scents pumped into a low-income housing development to help residents feel “optimism and happiness” to a billboard for a steak restaurant that blows the smell of char across a highway, ambient scenting, as the practice is known, is becoming big business.

That new car smell is being extended by auto manufacturers, hotels are spraying scents to boost productivity into meeting rooms and even plans for scented cellphones and credit cards are in the works. A fragrance for a Samsung store is cited for increasing electronic purchases by 20-30% - and - consumers related the scent (and ergo, the Brand) to innovation and excellence.

Even venerable institutions such as Credit Suisse and De Beers are getting into the scent business!

What’s interesting is that below the fragrance design is the deep examination of creating the ideal brand experience. What’s motivating? What’s emotional? What’s generating connection? What’s the desired outcome? Questions marketers ask constantly. Perhaps your next brainstorm will start with—What do we smell like? A provocative question (especially from a “Barbarian”!) So while we wait for smellavision and the iSniff – focusing on the basics always matter.