Laura Skelton Scent Thesis

Scent and Shopping by Laura Skelton

The Built Environment: Final Thesis Professor David Smiley April 20, 2006

Scent and Shopping Cultures of Scent

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Food

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Perfume

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Incense

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Street

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Decay

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Scent Architecture and Gender

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Deodorization

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Re-Odorization

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Scent and Retail Scent-Marketing

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Scent Design Technology

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Subliminal Scenting

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Brand Identity Scenting

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Evocative Scenting

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Implications Aura and Autheniticity

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Optimized Air

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Cultures of Scent Recent developments in the use of scent in retail architecture stem from a desire to resurrect the memory of the imagined aura of traditional cultures of scent. These include the culture of food, perfume, incense, streets, and decay. Smells of food emanate from the kitchen hearth and remind us of home and feminine domesticity. Perfume is tied to the boudoir, with connotations of sensuality and femininity. Incense exists in holy spaces, and is connected with sacrament and ritual. The smell of the street is the signature distinction of a neighborhood or city. The stench of decay radiates from the corpses of the morgue or the cemetery, or from garbage and waste, acting as an offensive reminder of the passage of time. The particular smells of a space define it as a particular type of place, connecting the scent cultures of food, perfume, incense, street, and decay to the perceived or imagined aura of a place. In "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," Walter Benjamin defined aura and authenticity, and examined how the perceptions and status of these have changed in an age where objects no longer have a unique status, and where serial reproduction is possible.1 The ideas he presents about aura and authenticity and the status of the "original" in connection with the work of art easily translate into the realm of "natural" and "artificial" smells. They deal directly with the source of much of the uneasiness and distrust that some people feel towards the use of artificial scents and scent-producing machinery in their environments. When the cultures of scent are no longer bound to the places within which they traditionally existed, the authenticity of the very identity of the place is thrown into question. With the possibility of serially

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Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." 3

reproducing smells of food, perfume, incense, streets, and decay, the unique scentidentity that once made a place special and gave it its auratic qualities is eliminated. The emergence of scent machine technology problematizes the idea of the aura of place in contemporary society. The implications that Benjamin sees of mechanical reproduction's profound effect on the kinds of art that are produced and on the way we perceive things in general suggest parallel readings of the effect of the mechanical reproduction of smells. Food Scent has always had strong ties to the aromas of food. Early memories of architectural origins center around the hearth.2 Its warm smells of cooking foods fill the space of the interior and become closely affiliated with ideas of domesticity and nourishment. Food smells are said to remind us of home. The smell of food cooking in the kitchen is a form of unintentional though important sensory experience that has roots extending back indefinitely. This form of smell is tied closely with the programming of our brain.3 It is thought that our large brains developed originally to distinguish between different smells, and so scent is tied to a very primitive area of our brains.4 Scent is also involved in our experience of food consumption, and so its enticements and aversions are central to the quest for nourishment and the balancing of a diet. Food smells can indicate the content of a bubbling pot as well as how well it has been tended, foreshadowing the dinner to come. 2

McEwen, Indra Kagis. "Between Movement and Fixity: The Place for Order." Socrates' Ancestor: An Essay on Architectural Beginnings. MIT Press, 1993, p. 101. 3 Lindstrom, Martin. BRANDsense: Build Powerful Brands through Touch, Taste, Smell, Sight, and Sound. New York: Free Press, 2005, p. 24. 4 Ackerman, Diane. A Natural History of the Senses. New York: Random House, 1990, p. 9-11 4

In the context of the city, food smells historically relate to market spaces. The smells of all of the different kinds of produce, fish, poultry, and meats convey important information about their quality and their freshness. Food smells have also been intentionally manipulated for centuries through the use of specially prepared spices. The prices the aristocracy was willing to pay for imported spices is in itself an indication of how much value has always been placed on creating positive smells in the context of food. Spices were used to flavor food in general, to prevent spoilage, and to cover up bad tastes5. Perfume The perfumed boudoir is the connotation raised by the sensual aspect of scent. The use of perfume for cosmetic enhancement is an ancient practice, dating back to before the time of ancient Egypt6. The unintentional scents of pheromones and body odors play a large part in animal and human sexuality and the game of seduction. These aspects are enhanced in our society through intentional manipulations of scent to exert influence over those surrounding. Some cultures have rituals of perfuming endowed with magic powers of seduction7. Violets have been particularly prized as sensual, partly due to the difficulty in creating a perfume out of the volatile floral essence8. This extended into architecture in the form of the sensuous female space of the dressing room, gently scented by the cosmetics of the woman.

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Le Guérer, Annick. Scent: The Mysterious and Essential Powers of Smell. London: Chatto & Windus, 1993, p. 71. 6 Forbes, R.J. "Cosmetics and Perfumes in Antiquity." Studies in Ancient Technology. Vol. 3. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1965, p. 2. 7 Le Guérer, 16. 8 Ackerman, p. 9-11. 5

Perfume and the space of the boudoir connote a sense of privacy and of intimacy. The individual scent of a woman combined with the intentional scent of her particular perfume infuses the space of the boudoir, tantalizing and inviting one inside. Incense Worship spaces have a long history of the use of scent to control the sensory atmosphere. The use of incense dates back through the history of churches to that of ancient temples. Incense is often burned during services in the Christian church, symbolizing a connection to heaven through the rising smoke, while simultaneously using this sensory connection to put worshippers in mind of a higher realm. The recipe for kyphi, an Egyptian perfume, is inscribed in the walls of a temple there where priestperfumers do their work9. The Egyptians referred to perfume as the "fragrance of the Gods"10. The formula for the perfume to be burned in the Jewish temple was given directly to Moses, and it was only to be used in the temple11. The connotation of this scent was restricted to the holy space of the temple, and its sweet odor was to be associated only with God. Paradise was supposed to be scented with sweet odors12. The temples of Islam had rose-scented mortar, while that of Babylonian temples was scented with perfumes13. Emperors capitalized on the powerful connotations of scent in the creation of their characteristic spaces. Nero, at dinner parties, would install pipes to conduct perfumes to

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Le Guérer, 111. Forbes, 8. 11 Le Guérer, 115. 12 Le Guérer, 121. 13 Ackerman, 36. 10

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diners at each plate14. He also scented his palace with rose petals15. Cleopatra is said to have been particularly devoted to the use of perfumes, scenting her entire body, lining her walls with roses, and scenting the sails of her ship16. Temples in China were built of unlaquered cedarwood, which emitted a sweet scent17. The doors of a palace in Khorsabad were so scented that they perfumed the air when they were opened and closed18.

Street The aura of the city, its distinctive smell that triggers memories in the mind of a particular place, has existed as long as the city itself.19 Even today, the smell of New York in the summer brings instant recollections to anyone's mind who has been in the city during the hottest months of the year. The scent of different neighborhoods in Chicago communicates the ethnicity of their inhabitants through the residual odors of cooking spices and the stalls of street vendors. Industrial cities can be smelled from miles away as the nose picks of traces of chemicals and exhaust carried by the air. The "wet soot, dank cold stones of London; the sea brine and stagnant water of Amsterdam; the sweat-soaked felt boots and sourish fetid bodies of Moscow; the dead incense and ancient dust of Florence; the stale beer, boiled pigs' feet and sauerkraut of Munich, and the bitter black coffee of Rio de Janeiro" all give an immediate sense of the atmosphere of a

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Forbes, 29. Ackerman, 36. 16 Ackerman, 59. 17 Ackerman, 60. 18 Ackerman, 60. 19 Illich, Ivan. H2O and the Waters of Forgetfulness: Reflections on the Historicity of "Stuff". Dallas: The Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, 1985, p. 47. 15

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place.20 As Ivan Illich writes, "Odor is a trace that dwelling leaves on the environment."21 The scent of the street is an instantaneous indicator of the use of a space, the hygiene of the inhabitants, and the types of cooking that goes on. This city aura locks the memory of the street in the mind of the visitor and the resident alike, each assured that nowhere else can this experience be had but in the particular block, neighborhood, or city in which it is found. Decay Parallel to the notion that pleasant smells signify sanctity was the idea that evil stank. The scent of decay came from hell, witches' dens, graveyards, sewers, garbage dumps, and sick wards. Vivid descriptions of hellish regions often mentioned their horrible, rotting, sulpherous stench. Witches emitted satanic odors and carefully cultivated noxious breath to use as a weapon. They developed bodily stench from spending time collecting ingredients for their deadly brews from graveyards and gallows22. The idea of the mine as an abyss of hell is referenced in one early 19th century story. When a young man looks into the entrance to the deep mine, he sees that "In the abyss there were stones—slag, or burned-out ores—lying around in a wild jumble, and sulfurous gases rose steadily from the depths as if a hellish brew were boiling, the vapors of which were poisoning all of nature's green delights"23. Just like the priests created pleasant fragrances to waft through the holy spaces, witches created foul-smelling brews to work evil powers.

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Lohmann, Karl. "The Scents of the Cities." The American City & Country. Dec 1954, p. 54. 21 Illich, 51. 22 Le Guérer, 5. 23 Hoffmann, 311. 8

This idea of bad scent as connected to evil and dangerous things carried into early theories of medicine. Physicians believed that diseases were caused by "bad air" or miasma. It was common knowledge that smelling foul odors actually made people sick24. The congestion of cities and the lack of sanitization methods led to the concentration of graves, sewage, garbage, and smoke that fouled the air of the city25. The spread of the plague and the failure in efforts to combat it led doctors to try many tactics, such as the burning of incense and the use of perfumes to ward off the disease-causing stench26. Floors of castles in the medieval age were strewn with rushes, lavender, and thyme to ward off typhus27. Scent Architecture and Gender The changing role of scent in society, and particularly in architecture, is closely linked to gender roles and their connections to rationalism and the condemnation of the sensual. The scent-cultures of food, perfume, incense, street, and decay were rejected by the Platonic pursuit of pure, rational form, which scorned odors as vulgar and feminine.28 Following this mode of thought, Alberti's treatise on techniques of perspective construction helped to set the path for architecture for centuries. Architecture ceased to be conceived as a habitable space, and became the purely visual-rational form of plan, section, and perspective drawing. This mindset infuses modernist ideology as well, with an increased reliance on the photograph as the defining lens through which architecture is

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Le Guérer, 40. Illich, 54-57. 26 Le Guérer, 59. 27 Ackerman, 25. 28 Aamodt, Mette. "Architecture Smells." Immaterial/Ultramaterial: Architecture, Design, and Materials. Ed. Toshiko Mori. New York: Harvard Design School in association with George Braziller, 2002, p. 66. 25

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viewed. The traditional ideas of the Greeks of architecture and the city as being defined through movement, through a communal ritual dance weaving the city together, was replaced by a static, sense-deprived, visual conception of architecture as pure form existing in a world without habitation or decay.29 Architects attempted to elevate the practice of architecture to the rational level of pure form, into an otherworldly realm of harmonious lines and planes. This visual hegemony perpetuated throughout the majority of the western architectural tradition. Because of this rationalist tradition, and because of the power status of men in architecture, the history of western architecture is the history of masculine architecture. Masculine architecture dominates. It is conceived from the exterior, as a display of power, rationality, and grandeur.30 It is visual architecture, perceived from a distance, as pure rational form descended to earth to rest upon a hill or in a city square. The eye perceives the underlying order and the exercise of control. However, this masculine architecture is not inherently conducive to dwelling. Many see this rationalistic masculine world as "alien, uncomfortable, and even dangerous."31 It is cold, without personality, and does not acknowledge real-world human experience. As Ivan Illich writes, "Unlike the architect who constructed a palace to suit the aura of his wealthy patron, the new architect constructed a shelter for a yet unidentified resident who was supposed to be without odor."32 Modernism is a deodorized architecture, with clean lines and white walls expressing the sensory purity of the form.

29

McEwen, p. 81. Betsky, Aaron. Building Sex: Men, Women, Architecture, and the Construction of Sexuality. New York: William Morrow and Company, 1995, p. xii. 31 Betsky, xii. 32 Illich, 54. 30

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Parallel to the overt tradition of western architecture, the masculine tradition, is the tradition of the decoration of the interior. This is feminine architecture, the architecture of dwelling.33 According to Aaron Betsky, it was the role of women "to make livable the world men made."34 This involved gathering objects that evoke memories, such as photographs and paintings, lining walls with textiles to soften and warm the interior space, and arranging the home to be pleasing to the senses, as a refuge from the harsh exterior world. The room lined with a carpet, woven wall-hangings, curtains, pillows, soft upholstered furniture, and blankets, evokes the interiority of the womb space, and acts as the perfect counterpoint to masculine architecture. Female architecture is not about visual dominance and the view from a distance. The separation required for the apprehension of a totalistic view is impossible in the interior realm of the feminine. The interior dwelling spaces by their very nature connect physically with the body, and are apprehended bit by bit through inhabitation. The world of women is the world of the home, the space that makes dwelling possible, and mediates the cold abstraction of masculine space and human needs for comfort and a sense of habitation. An architecture that recognizes the human potential for a multi-sensory connection with a physical space is inherently feminine. Instead of mandating distance as masculine architecture does, multi-sensory architecture necessitates a close physical intimacy with the materials of the interior. Scent architecture, architecture apprehended through the sense of smell, is thoroughly feminine. Scent is a primitive, irrational scent, linked directly in the brain to the centers of memory and emotion. With scent, we feel and remember before we rationalize, nearly opposite the process of visual perception. Scent 33 34

Betsky, xiv. Betsky, xiii. 11

architecture requires the inhabitation of a space and the imbibing of its air. Scent architecture is always interior, even when it occurs outdoors, since it is about the sensory qualities of the air which fills a space and transmits to us the particles picked up from the objects which coexist with us in the space. Scent is inherently connected to domesticity. Food-scents emanate from the hearth, the traditional center around which the home revolves. Perfume-scents waft from the boudoir, the epitome of intimate interiority. Scent architecture rejects the masculine hegemony of the visual, recognizing other aspects of the human need to dwell. Deodorization The conception of bad smells as dangerous, and needing to be covered by perfumes, shifted during the time of the Enlightenment to an ideal of odorlessness35. No longer was the city and the body to be drenched in characteristic scents, creating an aura of place. The odors of the city that act as signs of the patterns of use of the inhabitants were to be effaced. The ideal city conveyed nothing to the nose, and thereby relieved it from the need to be bombarded by the undesirable information of the city. Paris in the Enlightenment went about paving and whitewashing the entire city in order to rid it of noxious odors and to make it seem more sanitary36. This process was only furthered by the advent of refrigeration technology. The traditional scent of the marketplace, with its information about the freshness and quality of the foods for sale, was replaced by a deodorized, whitewashed space, perfectly clean but perfectly bland. However, this new deodorized city lost much of the emotional ties that smell can bind to the memory. Even

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Illich, 47. El-Khoury, Rodolphe. "Polish and Deodorize: Paving the City in Late-EighteenthCentury France." Assemblage 31 (1997): 6-15, p. 7. 36

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without being able to identify a particular smell, we can immediately recall the place it emanates from if we smell it again37. This rationalist need to deodorize the cityscape created a prejudice against odor and a desire to rid all places of their defining smells. Along with the hygienic process of deodorization, the evocative, defining odors of the pre-enlightenment city were obliterated from the perceptual realm. The aura of the city, its distinctive odor that set it apart from every other place and defined its specialness, was stripped away. The deodorized city, although it lacked the sickening stench of decomposition and decay, also lacked the sweet smells of food, the indications of habitation, and the fragrance of perfume. City dwellers increasingly experienced sensory deprivation, and became more and more detached from the intimate connections they once had with the spaces and objects of their daily lives, their interactions limited solely to visual perception.38 Re-Odorization After a long process of attempts at deodorization of the city, the body, and the retail environment, a new trend emerged in scent design. The modern ideals of city life trumpeted sanitation and cleanliness, and bound them to ideals of deodorized space. However, something seemed to be lost in the process. Writers recalled the aura of the city in a nostalgic way, and wrote about the ability of the smell of a certain neighborhood to instantly trigger memories and associations of place. Marcel Proust, in his novel Swann's Way, writes about his plunge into vivid memory triggered by the smell of a Madeleine. Writers recalled that home always had a welcoming smell, whether of familiar foods 37

Judd, Dennis R., and Susan S. Fainstein, eds. The Tourist City. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999, p. 82. 38 Pallasmaa, Juhani. "Hapticity and Time: Notes on Fragile Architecture." Architectural Review, p. 78. 13

cooking in the kitchen, or of traces of perfumes worn by loved ones, or simply the materials that filled the space. While deodorization attempted to free us from the inescapable stench of modern industrial life through modern sanitization procedures and later through new environmental control technologies such as HVAC systems, they removed the positive scents that evoked the aura of place along with the stench of filth and decay. The sense of smell, long ignored in our culture, began to regain a foothold in our world with the 1960's love of scented candles and incense. It came back into its own in the early 1990s with the sudden rise in popularity of aromatherapy. Self-help enthusiasts devoured scented products of all varieties with purported healing benefits. Peppermint for energy, chamomile for relaxation, jasmine for sensuality… Many companies added aroma-therapeutic aspects to their products to draw consumers with promises of salutary effects through self-indulgence. Side by side with the aromatherapy trend came new research into olfaction and the effects of different scents on mood.39 The belief that pleasant smells could have healing powers, which had vanished from western discourse centuries earlier, had suddenly reappeared. The positive findings of these studies linking certain scents to effects on mood further fueled the scent trend. Aromatherapy moved from a niche market to a ubiquitous part of products in many stores. Until recently, smell had eluded the grasp of modern rationalism. Scientists little understood how olfaction worked, and even today there are many lingering questions. One problem stems from the fact that, unlike colors, there do not seem to be a limited set of primary scents from which all other scents can be derived. Because we can distinguish 39

Peltier, Mark. "Conditioning Indoor Environments Using Aroma Technology." DCI. New York. March 1998: 18-21. 14

such an incredibly wide range of smells, the most those interested in the study of smell could do was to create awkward systems of classification for smells, based on a variety of shaky systems of logic, that still had too many groupings to be practical. Finally, with the aromatherapy research, some progress was made in harnessing primal scent with the reins of rationalistic thought. In 1990, at the same time aromatherapy took off, some of the first retail scent companies were started.40 With the increasing indications from different studies that scent played a major role in shaping our emotions, moods, and even our productivity, scentmarketing companies such as AromaSys saw ways to capitalize on the findings. Research was conducted that linked certain ambient smells to increased time spent in a store, more money spent in malls, and a higher value estimate of products. Companies developed that offered to make the benefits of this new knowledge available to retailers. Though many details of the workings of smell, and of the rules of its components, still eluded science, smell was brought under the control of rationalistic thought through the desire to optimize profits. By focusing only on sight and sound, these new companies advocated, retailers were missing out on an important opportunity to connect with their customers.41 Individuals in our consumer society were being bombarded with more and more visual advertising messages all the time, and the messages were becoming less and less effective as time went on. Consumers had become adept at tuning out advertising, navigating their world with habitual mental blinders that let them ignore advertising messages. Scent,

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AromaSys, Inc. AromaSys, Inc. – Environmental Aroma Systems. 2006. (19 April 2006). 41 AromaSys, Inc. 15

however, is unavoidable by its very nature. While customers might close their eyes, sooner or later they must use their nose to breathe. The olfactory system is located in the evolutionarily oldest part of the brain.42 Scent acts as a direct link to memory and emotion, bypassing the rational processing facilities that sight and sound go through, and connecting with us on a much deeper and more primal level.43 Instead of rationally evaluating scent, our olfactory system works to trigger instantaneously memories of where we have encountered a scent in the past, and all of the emotions that we have associated with it. In a world of increasingly aware consumers, the medium of scent held invaluable opportunities for brands to connect to consumers on a deep-seated, emotional level. In essence, what the scent-marketing companies were offering retailers was the opportunity not only to reclaim the positive aspects of the odors they had banished from their stores, but also to intentionally manipulate the olfactory aura of their stores to influence the behavior of their customers. While retailers in the days of real smells could control the timing of when and where they baked bread or displayed flowers in order to draw customers, the retailers of the 1990s and 2000s had free reign to "design" the scents they thought would have the optimal effect. And optimize they did. Research institutes such as the Smell and Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago, International Flavors & Fragrances in New York, the Olfactory Research Fund in New York, and Morell Chemical Senses Center provided data on the use of smell in influencing behavior, and on the remarkable effects of certain smells on certain target groups. With all this new science at their fingertips, retail companies could find the best 42 43

Aamodt, "Architecture Smells," 66. Lindstrom, p. 24. 16

way to influence their target audience. Whether it was by wafting imperceptible odors through their store to subliminally influence spending behavior, or by creating a signature scent as a kind of exclusive incense to identify their brand, or by pumping scents that created pleasant atmospheres of nostalgia to put customers in a mood to purchase their products, many retailers found ways to use scent that they would not have in the past. A new era of manufactured aura had arrived. Scent-Marketing With the new research on the potential applications of aromatherapy, scentmarketing companies began offering their services to retailers as a way to take advantage of the untapped potential of smell. They offered retailers new ways of using smells to their advantage. They provided proprietary scent machines with different smell inserts at a fee to retailers, many of whom began to run scenting trials in some of their stores.44 The firms began to build scent libraries of basic essences and exclusive blends, which they pledged would create certain atmospheres.45 They offered customized scent creation services for retailers that wanted a distinctive aura to pervade their stores.46 By offering their services to big-name companies, the scent-marketing businesses created a buzz about their new, subtle way to influence consumer behavior and to create emotional connections between customers and brands. One of the earliest scent-marketers to emerge was the St. Paul, Minnesota-based AromaSys Inc. Founded in 1990, the firm took off during the aromatherapy boom of that

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Enis, Matthew. "The Smell of Success—Literally; New Wave of POP Marketing Has Customers Following Their Noses." CSP. June 2004. 45 ScentAir, Inc. ScentAir: The Market Leader of In-Store Scent Solutions for Brands and Retailers. 2005. (19 April 2006). 46 AromaSys, Inc. 17

decade.47 The company takes a different approach from some of the other firms in that it does not claim that its scents will increase retail sales.48 Instead, they see "controlled scenting" as a new aesthetic tool that designers can use "to add aromatic elements to the design process, harmonizing with architectural themes and specific location features."49 AromaSys sees smell as adding to the aesthetic pleasure of a space, much in the same way that a pleasant color of paint and an attractive design scheme would make customers feel more positive about their store experience. They refer to their blends as "aromatic symphonies," to be appreciated in much the same way as music.50 Currently AromaSys is the supplier of "environmental aroma blends" to many casinos and hotels, as well as to a handful of retailers.51 The industry leader in scent-marketing is the six-year-old Charlotte, North Carolina-based company ScentAir.52 Unlike AromaSys, ScentAir stands by their claims that carefully scented retail spaces show increased sales. They emphasize that their systems "help enhance environments, communicate brands and create memorable experiences."53 They have a far larger library of pre-blended scents than AromaSys, grouped on their website into the categories Fresh, Environmental, Floral, Bakery, Drink, Candy, Fruit, Fun Food, Holiday, and Entertainment.54 ScentAir provides environmental

47

AromaSys, Inc. Lee, Elizabeth. "Dollars and Scents: The Nose Knows, or Does It? Businesses Using Artificial Aromas to Get Customers in Right Mood." The Atlanta Journal – Constitution 22 Aug. 2004: MS.1. 49 AromaSys, Inc. 50 AromaSys, Inc. 51 AromaSys, Inc. 52 "Scent System Creates Perfect Atmosphere In Candy Store; Chocolate Scent Draws Customers Into Store." ScentAir Press Release. Mar 2004. 53 ScentAir, Inc. 54 ScentAir, Inc. 48

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scenting services to a long list of businesses, including retailers, entertainment centers, hotels, food companies, groceries, convenience stores, and the government (rotting corpse scent for battlefield simulation).55 They have gotten a significant amount of press coverage with the addition of scents to various stores across the world, and they share stories of some of their successful solutions for different companies with their potential clients.56 ScentAir has established itself as the firm to go to with questions related to scent and its connection to brand identity. While AromaSys and ScentAir are the main companies that specifically offer scent-marketing services, there are other research firms and marketing companies that also offer scent services to retailers. Marketing Aromatics, a subsidiary of Behavioral Dynamics, which was set up in 1989 by a group of Swiss businessmen, offers to tailor custom corporate identity smells that businesses can use to mark their interactions with the public.57 BrandEmotions, a subsidiary of New York-based International Flavors & Fragrances, offers to match appropriate scents to brands by studying the demographics of the target customer and identifying the most appealing aspects of the brand, then finding a suitable fragrance.58 Georgia-based EnviroScent has super-strength aroma machines capable of scenting areas within a baseball stadium.59 Orlando-based Fragrance Technologies is responsible for scenting the Christmas store at Disney World.60 Aroma

55

ScentAir, Inc. Hall, Matthew. "Making Dollars from Senses; See It? Smell It? It Must Be Retail." VM&SD Magazine. July 2003. 57 Bidlake, Suzanne. "Scents of Real Purpose." Marketing 15 Oct. 1992: 21. 58 Tischler, Linda. "Smells Like Brand Spirit." Fast Company 97 (2005): 52-57. 59 Sutter, John David. "Marketing to the Senses." Knight Ridder Tribune Business News. Washington: Dec 3, 2005, 1. 60 Murphy, Kate. "A Sales Pitch Right Under Your Nose." New York Times. Sept 13, 1998: 8. 56

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Co., based in Oxfordshire, England, also markets both localized scent samplers and environmental scenting machines.61 Scent Design Technology During the aromatherapy craze of the 1990s, many retail products went on the market purporting to be able to scent interior spaces in pleasant ways. Sprays and aerosols could leave a residue on interior surfaces. Heated oils and ceramic devices were inexact, messy, and difficult to control precisely.62 Artificial scents were also much more primitive, and with the lack of control that the distribution methods had, they had a high potential for being cloying and nauseating rather than pleasing. The advances that recent years have brought in the creation of artificial aromas and in systems for distributing them in a controlled manner throughout retail environments, therefore, played a large part in making the scent-marketing trend possible. AromaSys was the first to develop an effective method for distributing scent over a space. Instead of using messy, inaccurate heating units to activate and release aroma, their EAS 2000/5000 Aroma Systems use an electric charge over a liquid scent medium to release precisely controlled quantities of scent.63 The AromaSys scent machines also can be installed to use existing HVAC systems to distribute their scents, solving the problem of achieving an even scent distribution.64 ScentAir uses a similar system for their scent distribution machines. Their ScentWave machines can disperse scents over areas of up to 2,000 square feet, and are

61

Enis, "The Smell of Success—Literally. Hall, "Making Dollars From Senses." 63 AromaSys, Inc. 64 AromaSys, Inc. 62

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programmable to release scents in specific quantities at different times.65 The machines come with fragrance cartridges that are easily replaced by store employees.66 EnviroScent's ScentHawg machines are made for larger purposes. A fan belt sends air across trays of scented gel made from natural oils. Friction then releases the scent molecules from the gel base. The machines are two feet wide and are made to sit near concessions areas in a ballpark.67 ScentAir has a separate system called ScentPOP, which covers areas of up to 200 square feet with fragrance. The ScentPOP technology is intended more for applications such as vending machines, where an aroma of that which lies inside can induce customers to purchase the sealed products.68 This product allows retailers to create "scent zones" within their stores, targeting different smells at different points in their customers' wanderings and creating a dynamic scent experience. More recently, Japanese scientist Yasuyuki Yanagi and his collegues at the Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute in Kyoto developed a scent-dispensing device called the air cannon.69 The machine uses cameras to track the eyes of passersby, and when they pass it aims a blast of scent just below them to hit them right in the nose.70 The machine is so exact that someone standing a mere 20 inches away will smell

65

ScentAir, Inc. Hall, "Making Dollars From Senses." 67 Sutter, "Marketing to the Senses." 68 "ScentAir Technologies Introduces Scent for Vending Machines; Chocolate Sales Increase When Scent Was Added to Vending Machine." ScentAir Press Release. Jul 2003. 69 Knight, Will. "Where's That Funny Smell Coming From?" New Scientist. London. April 3, 2004: 22. 70 Knight, "Where's That Funny Smell Coming From?" 66

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nothing.71 This micro-scenting increases the possibilities for targeted scent-marketing, beyond an ambient, lingering scent, and opens the potential for a space that has different scents in neighboring areas. Just as important as the advances in scent distribution were the advances made in technology for scent analysis. Scientists created new forms of electronic sniffing devices that could create a chemical signature for the atmospheric aroma of a space. Smell research organizations collected new scent signatures by traveling around the world with this sniffing apparatus, collecting the scents of different places and plants and bringing them back to the laboratory. By finding the specific chemicals that created different smells, the researchers were able to create scientific smell databases, some with over 20,000 distinct odors, that they could then use to design intentional synthetic aromas.72 Subliminal Scenting Definitely the most covert of retail scent design tactics, subliminal scenting is when stores infuse the air with imperceptible quantities of fragrance that are supposed to have a subconscious behavioral effect on their customers. Several studies by different researchers led to new findings about the effects of certain smells on buying behavior. The opportunity to psychologically influence their customers into spending more money enticed some retailers into imperceptibly scenting the air of their stores. Dr. Alan Hirsch of the Smell and Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago was one researcher who believed in smell's ability to subliminally influence shoppers. He conducted an experiment where he demonstrated that when a room was

71

Knight, "Where's That Funny Smell Coming From?" "Science and Technology: The Sweet Smell of Success." The Economist. London: Sept 5, 1998. 348.8084: 75-77. 72

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scented with a floral fragrance, shoppers were willing to spend more money on a pair of sneakers and were more likely to want to purchase them.73 Interestingly, his findings were true whether the scent was perceptibly pleasant or imperceptible and subliminal. According to Hirsch's data, 84 percent of test subjects preferred the sneakers in the scented room, and also that they would pay $10 more for them.74 The idea that scenting a dressing room in an athletic shoe store like flowers could have such a dramatic effect on the customers' evaluation of the product and willingness to spend money is a strong indication of the potent powers of smell to subliminally influence our attitudes and emotions. Mall designers have taken advantage of subliminal scenting research as well. A mall in a suburb of Montreal was scented different odors.75 According to researcher JeanCharles Chebat, when "clean" scents were present, such as lavender or citrus, mall patrons spent on average twice as much as when the mall was unscented.76 The Fragrance Foundation in New York found that floral smells influenced shoppers to spend more time and more money in shopping malls.77 In a similar study, a fruity-floral scent infused in a jewelry store increased the lingering time of shoppers.78 Steven W. Schussler, the senior vice president of development, at the Rainforest Café, says of the chain's practice of pumping floral scents into their retail areas, "It makes you curious and makes you more

73

Stiefel, Chana. "Does a Floral Scent Make You Buy?" Science World New York. Sept 20, 1999: 7-9. 74 Stiefel, "Does a Floral Scent Make You Buy?" 75 Daks, Martin C. "Smell, Listen and Spend Money Like Crazy." NJBIZ 18.24 (2005): 12. 76 Torabi, Farnoosh. "A Nose for Business." Money Oct 2003: 34. 77 Hunter, Beatrice Trum. "The Sales Appeal of Scents." Consumers' Research Magazine. Oct 1995: 8. 78 Murphy, "A Sales Pitch Right Under Your Nose." 23

likely to spend money. Call it a subliminal awakening."79 Peppermint and vanilla, however, are apparently not so effective in influencing spending behavior.80 According to research by Maureen Morrin, "contemplative" buyers, those who spend more time making their purchase decisions than impulse buyers, were the most influenced by the presence of a pleasant odor.81 While shoppers might consciously perceive the air coming from the shopping center's HVAC system no differently from how they did in the past, the subliminal influence of the subtle scents still seems to encourage shoppers to desire to spend more time in the store and to be willing to spend more money. Since subliminal scenting is perceived by many as being as manipulative as flashing subliminal messages on a movie screen to get people to buy something, it seems to be the area of scent-marketing tool that companies are the least willing to admit to using. While in some ways it can be seen as simply creating a more pleasant environment for shopping, it could also be seen as an underhanded means to increase sales. As more and more shopping malls, restaurants, retail stores, and casinos use subliminal scenting as another means to influence spending behavior, consumers should be aware of the likelihood that every sensory outlet through which they interface with their environment may be used as a means to influence them. Brand-Identity Scenting Nowadays scent-marketing companies offer to create "signature scents" for brands and for corporations. The intention of this brand-identity scenting is to create a unique odor which customers and employees will come to associate strongly with the

79

Murphy, "A Sales Pitch Right Under Your Nose." Torabi, "A Nose for Business." 81 Daks, "Smell, Listen and Spend Money Like Crazy." 80

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brand. When they smell it their memories of (it is hoped) pleasant past experiences in the store and with the product will rush back to them, strengthening their emotional ties to the brand. This type of scenting is the modern-day equivalent of the incense of the temple. The ancient Hebrews had a recipe for special incense that was only to be used in the temple for the worship of God. Whenever someone smelled that unique odor, they knew they were in the sacred space. Taking a lesson from religion, retailers see that by creating a scent that is exclusive to the space of their store, shoppers will come to form emotional memory ties linking the pleasant odor to the pleasant experience of the store. Retailers can create an artificial aura for their retail environment. Victoria's Secret is one example of a store using a signature fragrance to trigger emotional attachments in their customers.82 The interior of every Victoria's Secret store is infused with the aroma of their fragrance products. What many customers don't realize, however, is that this identifying Victoria's Secret odor is not a simple result of the juxtaposition of their beauty and fragrance sampling areas with the lingerie area of the store. The scent machines, or "environmental aroma systems," in the store, supplied by AromaSys, waft a carefully selected, seductively feminine scent throughout the store environment.83 The smell subtly infuses the clothes, so that even upon returning home, purchasers can sniff their new acquisitions and be transported back to the sensual femininity of the Victoria's Secret experience. Similarly, Abercrombie & Fitch retail stores use ScentAir machines to diffuse a distinctive aroma throughout their stores.84 Though some of the scent is from the perfume test sprays in the stores with A&F's

82

Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 56. Torabi, "A Nose for Business." 84 ScentAir, Inc. 83

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signature scent, they enlist ScentAir to ensure that their unique aroma evenly pervades the stores and the clothing under all circumstances. Sony Style enlisted the services of ScentAir to design a custom scent for their stores. In keeping with their innovative image, they wanted a scent that was noticeable and memorable.85 They particularly were targeting female shoppers at their 16 mall locations.86 By combining notes of mandarin orange and vanilla87 with other "secret ingredients," they created a unique olfactory experience.88 This olfactory marketing effort was soon followed by an attempt by the Samsung Experience store in the AOL-Time Warner Building to create its own scent identity. The smell Samsung designed was "a unisexy, modern fragrance along the lines of Calvin Klein's cK One."89 Although both Sony Style and Samsung sell electronics, which have virtually nothing to do with smell, both companies saw the benefit of creating a distinctive aura that could be found only in their stores. ScentAir also lists Best Buy as a client, further indicating the trend in the use of scent to brand electronic retailers.90 Brand-identity scenting is a way for companies to create a unique aura for their brand that deepens the emotional associations that connect them to their customers. Fashion retailers use signature scenting to create an identifying trigger to remind shoppers about what their store and their brand are all about. Even when customers take the clothes home, they can relive the scent of the store that pervades their purchases. For electronics stores that may sell very similar products, having an emotional impact that 85

ScentAir, Inc. Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 56. 87 Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 56. 88 ScentAir, Inc. 89 Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 52. 90 ScentAir, Inc. 86

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sets them apart from other retailers plays a vital role in keeping them ahead of the competition. By using signature scents, retail environments connect with shoppers and fix an impression of their space in customers' minds. Evocative Scenting Many retailers use scents that they hope have strong nostalgic connections to trigger emotional responses and pleasant memories in their targeted shoppers. The scent might be an intense blast of something they are selling which customers cannot for some reason smell in the modern store environment. It might also be something that is not directly related to their product, but that is somehow closely associated with memories of using it. Perhaps these scents can be seen as helping us to visualize how enjoyable it would be to use the products by triggering our memories of using products like that in the past. Companies use scents that trigger our emotions and memories in an attempt to create a positive environment that makes us want to buy their products. The Hershey's Store in New York's Times Square uses scent machines to recapture the aroma that is lost when their products are sealed into airtight packages.91 The store blasts shoppers with an artificial chocolate smell as they enter.92 With the advances the past century made in refrigeration techniques and in hermetically sealed packaging, customers no longer are able to connect with Hershey's products in the way that they would have been able to in a past era. With everything wrapped up in plastic and foil, customers would smell mainly cleaning products and each other when they entered the store, not the enticing aroma of chocolate. With the advances in technology,

91

Higgins, Kevin T. "Surround Sound, Meet Surround Smell." Food Engineering. June 2004. 92 Lee, "Dollars and Scents." 27

one of the major selling points of chocolate, its tempting smell, was lost.93 Scent technology is able to solve the problem and then some. With a simple scent machine carefully equipped with a calibrated aroma, customers as they enter the store can feel as though they have been transported to the core of a chocolate factory paradise. ScentAir, the company responsible for the Hershey's Store chocolate aroma, also applied the technique at places such as Harry and David Chocolate, Dylan's Candy, and Chocolat.94 Many grocery stores are applying the same techniques in their different departments. The aromas that in the past let customers know that their produce was ripe, their bread fresh, and their flowers fragrant was overcome by modern refrigeration techniques. The smells of the marketplace were replaced by the deodorized space of the air-conditioned supermarket. While these advances helped greatly in promoting health and reducing spoilage, they also eliminated the wonderful smells that tantalized shoppers' palates and assured them of good quality. Grocers such as Kroger's supermarkets, Piggly Wiggly, Shop Rite, Super Target, and Bi-Lo turned to scent design to recapture the good smells of the marketplace.95 In the bakery departments, smells such as honeynut bread, butternut bread, apple pie, chocolate chip cookies, sugar cookies, or cake waft through the air even when there is nothing in the oven, or when the supermarket doesn't even have in-store baking facilities.96 In the produce departments, strawberry, melon, and citrus tell customers that the goods are fresh.97 Floral departments are artificially enhanced with smells as well, making up for the loss in fragrance caused by refrigeration and breeding 93

Hunter, "The Sales Appeal of Scents," 8. ScentAir, Inc. 95 ScentAir, Inc. 96 Lee, "Dollars and Scents." 97 Harper, Roseanne. "Bi-Lo, BJ's Test Scents in Produce, Other Areas." Supermarket News. May 3, 2004. 94

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techniques.98 ScentAir even has a special machine for individualized scent-sampling for various products that it has used in promotions within grocery stores for Post Banana Nut Crunch Cereal and Pillsbury Cookie Dough.99 Although the reality of a connection with the product and a true evaluation of its quality based on smell has been lost in the modern supermarket, a sensory connection has been reestablished between shoppers and goods through the use of artificially enhancing scent machines. While food-related stores use artificial scent machines to simulate the experience of the pre-sealed food market, stores that are not so directly tied to scent use aromas of nostalgia to put shoppers in the mood for buying. In the baby department at FAO Schwartz in New York, as well as at several other department stores, the odor of baby powder reminds customers about the pleasant, sweet-smelling side of babies.100 At the entrance to the same store, the smell of birthday cake invites shoppers to relive the excitement of shiny new toys.101 The swimwear department at Bloomingdale's exudes a coconut smell reminiscent of suntan lotion, making swimsuit shopping seem appropriate and fun even in the middle of winter.102 Saks Fifth Avenue, Marshall Field's, and Toys "R" Us use scent in different departments to similar effect.103 Sporting goods stores waft smells of freshly cut grass throughout, reminding shoppers of the playing field. The appliance store H.H. Gregg sent the aromas of home cooking drifting through their

98

Lee, "Dollars and Scents." Higgins, "Surround Sound, Meet Surround Smell." 100 Hall, "Making Dollars From Senses." 101 Hall, "Making Dollars From Senses." 102 Hall, "Making Dollars From Senses." 103 Hall, "Making Dollars From Senses." 99

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kitchen appliance areas.104 The smells of warm apple pie and sugar cookies were so enticing that some customers wanted to get the machines for themselves.105 Retailers use evocative scenting to recreate the ambiance of special experiences that are connected with their brand. This may be as direct as the smell of the experience of eating the food that is packaged and inaccessible. It may be the lost experience of smelling food in a store, which through simulation is made accessible to the shopper. It may also be some smell that is connected to the use of the product, which enhances an atmosphere that encourages shoppers to fantasize. These smell environments replace some of the realism that was lost in the process of deodorization and environmental conditioning with a simulation of what was once there, or with a projection of what could be. Aura and Authenticity

With the deodorization trend of the eighteenth century, much of the aura of the city and of the retail environment seemed to be lost in a whitewashed odorlessness.106 Instead of having the scents that characterized the marketplace or the shop-lined street, there was nothing but whiteness and odor-free zones. All smell was bad smell, and all of it was sought to be eliminated. While this led to vast improvements in the hygiene and sanitizing of the city, it annihilated the indescribable aromas that imbued each place with a unique identity. With advances in refrigeration techniques, the smells of fresh produce

104

Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 59. Lee, "Dollars and Scents." 106 El-Khoury, Rodolphe. "In Visible Environments: Architecture and the Senses in Eighteenth-Century France." Diss. Princeton University, 1996. 105

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or fish was replaced by a smell of deodorized chill, a lack of sensory stimulation.107 The traces left by the users of the place, the materials it was made of and that it housed, and the realities of its environment, were erased through whitewashing, paving, and refrigeration. This obliteration of olfactory stimulation, while initially perceived as wholesome and as freedom from the inescapable stench of the old city, at the same time eliminated much of the uniqueness of place that distinguished each space from every other by the information conveyed through the nose. To recapture the pleasant side of what was lost with deodorization while disallowing the foul stenches that used to accompany the sweet fragrances, scent machines were employed to reodorize space. The re-scenting of deodorized objects and spaces calls into question the perception of authenticity of this manufactured aura. Since the former requirements of a unique scent source that was subject to the transformations of time and had a particular existence in a specific place and context were eliminated by the implementation of machine-smells, the unique nature of the aura of a place became reproducible indefinitely. Flowers that bloomed only in one place at one time a year could be smelled year round at an even level of intensity throughout the air of a space. Reading into this phenomenon through the lens of Walter Benjamin's analysis of aura and authenticity in the age of mechanical reproduction illuminates some of the issues that this recreation of scent stirs up. Benjamin writes, "The presence of the original is the prerequisite to the concept of authenticity." The "unique existence" of the original, with the chemical and physical markings of its unique history, as well as the changes in ownership and position in space, 107

Mayo, James M. The American Grocery Store: The Business Evolution of an Architectural Space. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1993. 31

keeps it separate from any copies made, and is the source of the view that other instances are merely copies or forgeries.108 This existence of some more "real" or "original" object is necessary for the idea that another type of object is less real, or unoriginal, since it does not share the unique identity of the original. Similarly, the perception of machine-smell as artificial, simulated, or inauthentic seems to stem from the nature of its source. The existence of an original scent source, a "natural" source such as a flower, a fruit, or a cookie, is the prerequisite to the idea that machine-smells are somehow forgeries, a kind of inferior or dishonest approximation of the original scent source. The concept is similar to the idea of a recorded sound versus an "original" sound. With the technological improvements of recording media and improved quality of recorded sound (eliminating the identifying scratchy sounds of the vinyl record of previous decades), it is possible for there to be little essential difference between the "live" sound coming from the original source, whether it is the voice of a speaker or an instrument, and the sound coming from the recorded sound-machine. With new technologies of scent-atmosphere or "headspace" sampling, in which a smell is effectively recorded, the smell coming out of an advanced scent-machine could be essentially (chemically) the same smell that surrounds a plant, a slice of cake, or even a person. This smell would still be perceived as somehow inauthentic. This is not because of what it is, but because of the nature of its source. The idea that the scent machine is approximating the smell of something that exists outside of it, in a particular environment, with particular temporal qualities that affect it, makes the machine-scent somehow less authentic than the originally emitted odor of the "natural" source.

108

Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," II. 32

The temporal disconnect that the scent-machines effect is one aspect of the perceived inauthenticity of their smells. In the "real" world, smells are not static. An even number of parts per million of a particular combination of chemicals does not sit in the air smelling the same for an indefinite period of time. Only the scent machines make this at all possible. Smells shift with changing weather and winds, and with the inevitable changes over time that occur in their sources. As scent molecules are emitted from a source, the source must change as it loses these volatile pieces of itself to the atmosphere. Flowers wilt, fruits ripen and rot, cookies cool off and harden. The floral smell that comes from scent-machines does not take on a sickly-sweet smell of decay as time passes. Citrus machine-smells never become overripe and putrid. The machine-smells are carefully crafted to smell consistently the same every time they are activated. Changes occur only in the intensity, in the parts per million of the smell in the atmosphere. In smelling a rose, part of the uniqueness of the experience is in knowing that as each day passes, the scent of the rose will slowly change as it loses vitality and begins to wilt. The transitory nature of the experience of smelling a flower, and the knowledge that tomorrow the smell may fade, heightens the experience of smelling as we try to take in all that we can and connect the smell with a unique moment in time. The smell of a tray of cookies baking in the oven is to be savored, and also has a unique place in time. The smell of baking cookies can follow the work of mixing dough and following a recipe, and the smell contains the anticipation of eating the cookies once they come out and cool off. A spatial disconnect separates the machine-smells from their originals. The originals are dependent upon a particular environment to support them and by which they are affected. Benjamin points out this aspect of the reproduction of a work of art, writing,

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"technical reproduction can put the copy of the original into situations which would be out of reach for the original itself."109 Certain plants may only grow a certain way and smell a certain way in an obscure part of the rainforest. Certain food smells might be impossible without a full kitchen with an activated oven releasing volatile odor particles into the air. Scent machines disconnect smells from their usual required environments and place them in surroundings that they might never be found. Smells of cooking emanate from places with no kitchens, a store in winter smells like the ocean in summer, and a dressing room smells like a grassy meadow. The spatial impossibilities of the presence of the original smell add to the perceived distinction between the original smell source and the reproduction of the scent machine. The machine-smell can bring a faraway environment, the air of a distant place, into the breath of a customer in a store or a person in their home. Benjamin writes, "The situations into which the product of mechanical reproduction can be brought may not touch the actual work of art, yet the quality of its presence is always depreciated."110 With smells, the effect of taking them out of their normal surroundings and allowing them to "meet the beholder halfway" by reproducing them elsewhere is that smells that once were unique to a certain place or to the presence of a certain object are disassociated from that prerequisite. While this allows the sensual experience of places and things that are inaccessible, it destroys the intensity of the unique bond that previously was activated only in the presence of the original. Its aura is reproduced through the scent machines, but it is placed in a distanced context. The original emotional bonds to the aura of the original are weakened since the sensory 109 110

Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." 34

qualities that trigger that bond are experienced in a situation separated from the original. The experience of everyday life is made richer and multilayered with sensory triggers to emotions and memories that would normally lie dormant for long periods of time. The overall sensational level is heightened, but the unique aura of "original" places and things is diluted as more and more disparate, disjointed associations are made to the original smells. Certain flowers begin to smell like baby powder, and pine forests take on the smell of cleaning solution. Benjamin defines the aura of natural objects as "the unique phenomenon of a distance, however close it may be."111 In experiencing visually natural objects, you are always in a relationship to them of position and distance that makes your particular experience of them unique. Your position and distance relative to them makes your experience of them special, and something you would never be able to bottle up or recreate in quite the same way. Benjamin sees a desire in society to bring things ever closer, and to destroy the uniqueness of experience by accepting the reproduction in place of the original. In a Benjaminian view, by accepting the reproductions of scent machines in our desire to bring everything closer to us, we destroy the uniqueness of a special experience of a natural smell. As Benjamin realizes with regards to the photograph, "the work of art reproduced becomes the work of art designed for reproducibility."112 With the growing use of scent machines and scenting techniques, more and more scents are created instead of being recreated. As retail stores attempt to create unique aromas to mark their territory and to define a sense of place in their branded environments, some begin to use "artificially" 111 112

Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." 35

created scents instead of mimicries of natural odors. The growing impact that these artificial auras have on our collective consciousness is indicated by the results of the study by Alan Hirsch on the generational differences in smells that evoked nostalgic sentiments.113 While those of an older generation were nostalgic for the smell of tree, hay, and horses, the younger generations had stronger nostalgic associations with the smell of artificial scents such as Play-Doh, Pez, and jet fuel.114 To search for the authentic "original" for an artificial smell is nonsensical. There is no original that Play-Doh is mimicking, it is just Play-Doh, and it smells like Play-Doh. Even though the scent is entirely artificial, in that it was intentionally created to smell that way by people, the concept of authenticity does not come into play because it is not pretending to be something it is not. For many members of the younger generations, Play-Doh has a powerful aura, even though that aura is entirely man-made. The question then becomes: just as the photograph arguably transformed the entire perception of the work of art, has the scent machine changed the way that we smell? When smell no longer conveys information inherent to an object close at hand or to the nature of the environment we are in, but instead carries man-made messages to our nose and indicates the presence of created aura, is the entire way we use our noses changed? Optimized Air Along with all the findings on the ways in which certain scents affected consumer behavior, researchers discovered that there were dramatic differences between the scent

113

Barrie-Anthony, Steven. "On the Radar: On Scent, We've Barely Scratched the Surface." Los Angeles Times 4 Nov. 2004: F.1. 114 Barrie-Anthony, "On the Radar; On Scent, We've Barely Scratched the Surface." 36

perceptions and responses between different consumers. Internationally there were dramatic differences in smell sensitivities and preferences, and even regionally within the United States, people waxed nostalgic in response to different aromas. Generation played a role in preference for artificial or natural odors. Gender was a major factor in tests on consumer response to certain smells and their effects on spending behaviors. When stores were trying to influence their customers to feel a certain way by counting on their having certain associations and emotions tied to particular aromas, it was important that their target customers actually did have these desired emotional ties. More and more, businesses realized that scent architecture must be tailored to the target audience each store was trying to attract. Dr. Alan Hirsch's study analyzing generational differences in the perception of odors indicated that there was a striking difference between different age groups in which smells made them feel nostalgic, with older generations preferring natural smells, and the young preferring the artificial. Different scent preferences by country have also become apparent. According to Martin Lindstrom, author of BRAND sense and leader of a study on multisensory approaches to branding, people in Moscow are partial to "freshly washed clothes, hanging on a line in subzero weather."115 Those in Japan prefer apples, while Hispanics like vanilla.116 Those in the United States seem to enjoy the smell of a brand new car more than those in other countries.117 Dr. Eric Spangenberg discovered in his study that there were dramatic gender differences in consumer responses to scent. In a clothing store, he infused the women's

115

Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 58. Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 58. 117 Lindstrom, BRAND sense, 93. 116

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department with a subtle vanilla smell, and the men's department with the aroma of rose maroc, a sweetly spicy scent.118 Receipts almost doubled the days that the departments were scented.119 However, when he reversed the smells, customers spent less than when the departments were unscented.120 The gender differences in smell preference have huge implications for retailers who redesign their store environments to optimize sales through smell control. Not only do different genders have different preferences in fashion, but they even need to breathe different air to be in the optimal mood to spend. With all of the work on analyzing the differences between countries, generations, and genders and their effects on scent perception, it seems that the end result is a world in which everyone has optimized air. When companies are calculating the scent that will have the optimal effect on their target audience, they take into consideration the demographic effects of generation, gender, and nationality, plug that into the formula of their more specific target audience and the perception of their product that they wish to promote, and out of the formula comes pre-calculated scented air. Air that is optimized to deliver the most favorable financial returns is targeted at demographic segments of the population. Those who may not appreciate the air they must breathe being used as a marketing device, or those who are allergic to fragrance, cannot avoid being advertised to. Optimized air is necessarily simulated air. With scent machine technology, there is no longer a connection between perceived scent and an underlying reality. The world of scent architecture is a world of simulation. Inauthenticity is no longer possible,

118

Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 57. Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 57. 120 Tischler, "Smells Like Brand Spirit," 57. 119

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because in a world where scent can be created, and can no longer be accepted as a fact of nature indicating the presence of a natural scent source, then the line between true scents and artificial scents disappears, and the distinction becomes meaningless.121 We can infuse our offices with the scent of "holiday", or take in "summer" scents in the midst of a blizzard. The reference to an underlying reality has been taken away, and instead we have a simulated atmosphere of scent. With the advances of new directed scent technologies, the air that each person is smelling could potentially be totally different. Isolated individualized simulated environments could be created for each and every customer in the store. Undesirable customers could be shot with unattractive scents to drive them away. A young woman could be blasted with eau de vanilla and crayon, while her father would be fired at with sandalwood and hay. Each person could live in their own little reality created by the allsimulating new retail environments. Through nationality detection the scent recipes could be tweaked as well. No longer would shoppers have to smell odors that were more preferable to others. No longer would aura have to be a shared experience. While the age of the automobile made it possible to enter into the public sphere and travel through it while remaining in the private bubbles of our cars, as Margaret Morse notes in her essay "An Ontology of Everyday Distraction: The Freeway, The Mall, and Television," the age of optimized air eliminates the need for the bubble.122 We can exist in our own private sensory worlds without the need for bulky barriers such as the windows of an automobile, the ideal of privatized mobility.123 With the new scent control technologies, and

121

Poster, Mark, ed. Jean Beaudrillard, Selected Writings. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988, p. 166-184. 39

optimized targeting, everyone has the potential to coexist side by side in completely different sensory worlds, infused with an eternal scent invulnerable to decay. Increasingly, we are able to escape into sensory closets within our world. These closets of perception are becoming portable, so that when we are forced to travel through the public environment we can carry our own micro-environment with us, totally private and utterly controlled. With an ipod, we have total control over the sound of this microplace. With micro-scenting, we soon may exist in isolated scent-worlds. We are now able to play CD's of scent in our homes with Febreze ScentStories machines, infusing our personal world with a selected narrative in odor. We are no longer susceptible to the constraints of time, which alters smells and forces us to confront mortality through the odors of decay. We may exist in a world where these unpleasantries are eliminated, replaced by an eternal scent optimized to our demographic characteristics to create maximal sensory pleasure. The eternal scent will never wilt, cool off, overripen, rot, or fade, but accompanies us in our isolated world ever arousing memories of imagined aura.

122

Morse, Margaret. "The Ontology of Everyday Distraction: The Freeway, the Mall and Television," in Patricia Mellencamp, ed., Logics of Television (Bloomington, 1990) 193221. 123 Morse, 212. 40

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