May 08 2008 / by juldrich
Category: Culture Year: General Rating: 9 Hot
By Jack Uldrich
Cross-posted from www.jumpthecurve.net
What will the future smell like? On the face of it, it sounds
like a silly question but I believe that by thinking about the
question we might be able to glean some insights into the future.
The other day I was in Las Vegas to give a speech to the Food
Marketing Institute and it was my good luck to have the opportunity
to sit in on a presentation by Martin Lindstrom who is one of the world’s
leading branding experts.
His talk was absolutely fascinating and he spent a good deal of
time discussing how important the sense of smell is in branding.
(To this point, if I say “Crayola” crayon or Play-Doh my guess is
that many of you can almost smell those products’ unique
scents).
More interesting, however, Lindstrom discussed how certain
smells conjure up different emotions for people of different
generations. For example, if you were born before 1930 you are
likely to enjoy the smell of hay and manure; and if you born before
1960 the smell of freshly cut grass conjures up positive feelings.
(cont.)
Advances in technology, however, have since rendered these
smells less popular to younger generations. Due to the immense
popularity of the automobile, few of us any longer have much
contact with horses and, when we do, we don’t particularly care for
the smell of their waste product. With regard to freshly cut grass,
it was Lindstrom’s contention that people born after 1960 tend to
associate the smell with the chore of working and it is therefore
less enticing.
I can’t speak to the intellectual validity of these arguments
but it is an interesting thought exercise to consider how the
future might change the public’s emotional response to certain
smells—as well as how future technologies or products might create
new popular scents.
For example, if fuel cell technology or biofuels become popular
might the smell of gasoline be universally reviled in the future?
Could global climate change cause future generations to loath the
smell of wood-burning fires or the scent of freshly cut pine trees?
Or, perhaps, if self-cleaning and odor neutralizing nanomaterials
become the norm could the scent of Johnson & Johnson’s baby
powder lose its allure?
I don’t know. I also don’t know if new robots, high-powered
electric cars or any number of yet invented products and
technologies might have their own unique scents; but I’d be
interested in your thoughts on what some smells of the future might
be or on how you think our current associations with certain scents
might change over time.
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