What’s that smell?

What’s that smell?

Of all the senses, smell is the most powerful for bringing back memories and setting off emotions. This is because smells are processed in the limbic system, which is both the emotional centre of the brain and the place where long-term memories are stored. Many businesses have discovered this amazing power and are currently using artificial smells to trigger a purchase, evoke emotion or create a realistic experience.

Dollars and Scents

A pleasant scent in a shop puts you into a positive mood, making you relax, stay longer – and spend more. This concept, called scent marketing, is all the rage. The tentalising coconut aroma in Thomson’s UK travel agencies, for example, puts you in the mood for a tropical holiday. The mouth-watering smell of chocolate in London’s Superdrug on Valentine’s Day isn’t really coming from the boxes on sale – it’s being pumped into the building’s ventilation system. But it will still remind you to buy some chocolate for your girlfriend.

The scents are subtle and almost imperceptible – not enough to irritate people, but enough to form a particular association in their minds. The question remains whether this tactic takes advantage of innocent customers, who are quite unaware that it is being used.

Memory in a Bottle

A smell can bring back a memory so intensely that you feel you are going back in time. Could we somehow bottle these memories, to be used whenever we wish? That’s exactly what perfumers at Demeter Fragrances of New York do. They make over 200 amazingly accurate fragrances, such as rain, Christmas Tree, Thunderstorm, Chocolate Chip and Glue. According to the company, their goal is for each scent to transport the user back to a special place or time, such as childhood on the family farm. But not every smell can be easily copied. The company said that many customers had requested Puppy’s Breath, which is so chemically complicated that it’s very tough to capture.

The question is, would you really like to smell of black pepper or turpentine on your next date?

Weird Whiffs

Dale Air started out as an air-freshener firm. However, things changed in 1984, when the company was approached by the creators of the Jorvik Viking Centre, a replica of a British village at the time of the Viking invasions. They asked company founder Fred Dale whether he could manufacture nasty smells as well as pleasant ones, explaining that they wanted to add smell to make their exhibits more realistic. So the company manufactured the odors of fish, burning logs, a marketplace, and even the stench of a Viking toilet!

Since then, Dale Air has produced aromas such as Egyptian Mummy for the City Museum of Stockholm, Sweaty Feet for the inside of a submarine at the Imperial War Museum and Dinosaur Breath for the Natural History Museum in London. Since the 2007 ban on smoking, one of their most popular products has been the scent of ashtrays, supplied mainly to pubs. It seems customers miss the smell, which is so much a part of the pub experience.

(Viewpoints For Bachillerato 2 Student’s Book, Burlington Books)