It’s All in the Nose: Businesses That Invest Heavily in Scent Marketing

Of our five senses, smell is one that can have a profound effect. Fresh-baked goods can send us back to our childhood, watching our parents cook and practically tasting them with such a powerful smell. Scents can soothe us and help us fall asleep, which is why lotions and fragrant candles are found in practically every home. And an overpowering or unsavory scent can cause us to gag, covering our noses and seeking fresh air to escape putrid smells.

Scents are so powerful that researchers have even found that they can alter how we spend money. Scientific evidence has found customers are 100 percent likely to remember a smell, and 59 percent of people will spend more in a place that has a pleasing smell. Research has found shoppers will spend 54 percent more in stores with scent marketing, which also works to develop brand loyalty.

Even when you aren’t shopping, scents may be used to create relaxing and soothing environments for guests and patients in airports, hotels, spas and even hospitals. Let's take a look at exactly how businesses are using scent marketing to attract customers.

Four Types of Scent Marketing

There are four main ways to attract customers using scent: Aroma billboards, thematic smells, ambient smells and signature smells.

Aroma billboards are the most robust scent marketing tools in that they're as noticeable to the olfactory system as billboards are to an optical one. Businesses will use them in every store. Signature smells are all used by businesses in every one of their locations, so customers will know they have entered an establishment by a similar look and smell. The other two scent-marketing techniques are subtler and help create a relaxing mood or provide a clean smell in crowded spaces like malls.

But there’s no doubt about it: Scent marketing is big business. Whether you have realized it or not, you may have already been manipulated. Here are 30 businesses aiming to trick your nose into spending.

Burger King

Type of business: Restaurant

Year founded: 1954

Headquartered: Miami, Florida

How Burger King uses scents: That charcoal-grill scent of burgers cooking over an open flame doesn’t come entirely from the kitchen. Burger King uses scent marketing to pump that scent out its chimney, so your mind can’t help but envision a burger hot off the grill and choose BK over its competitors when hunger strikes.

The fast-food chain even tried its hand at a meat-scented cologne, Flame, in 2008 due to its flame-grilled popularity.

Abercrombie & Fitch

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1892

Headquartered: New Albany, Ohio

How Abercrombie & Fitch uses scents: To enhance its brand, retailer Abercrombie & Fitch has its own unique line of scents that it adds to its stores. In the early days, staff walked around spraying their Fierce perfume and found shoppers spent more.

Now, the chain has more advanced methods for pumping pleasing perfume into the space, although today, it uses its Elmwood fragrance.

Rolls-Royce

Type of business: Automotive

Year founded: 1906

Headquartered: London, England

How Rolls-Royce uses scents: Nothing beats a new-car smell, and the best of the best are those developed by luxury automobile manufacturers. The handcrafted leather interior and rich carpeting smell like money, and anyone climbing into the driver’s seat will heartedly breathe it in. 

Rolls-Royce used this new car “perfume” just like actual perfume creators in magazine ads. You could even run the scent over your wrist to carry it with you all day.

Starbucks

Type of business: Restaurant

Year founded: 1971

Headquartered: Seattle, Washington

How Starbucks uses scents: One of the strongest scents is that of freshly brewed coffee. TV commercials show the scent waking up members of a house and being lured to the coffee pot.

Of course, being a coffee shop means consumers passing by can’t help but notice when fresh brews are brewing, but when Starbucks added food to its menu, it found the cooking aromas were overpowering the coffee. After sales dropped because of it, Starbucks started adding scent infusers to keep the coffee aroma as the main feature.

Bloomingdale's

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1861

Headquartered: New York

How Bloomingdale's uses scents: Department stores benefit by using scent marketing across their various departments. In swimsuits, for example, you may get a whiff of coconut-enhanced suntan lotion setting a tropical olfactory experience. In the baby department, baby powder will match the scent of a newborn and may trigger more spending on infant clothing and gear. Over in lingerie, sweet lilac wafts through the air, swirling around nightgowns as if you were in a bedroom getting ready for bed. 

Cineplex

Type of business: Entertainment

Year founded: 1999

Headquartered: Toronto, Canada

How Cineplex uses scents: The smell of butter-topped popcorn at the movies is part of the movie-going experience, which is why movie theater chains like Cineplex do more than keep the popper popping. They pump the scent into the air in all areas of the theaters, so even if you managed to pass up the snack stand when you walked in, you’ll get hungry and may find yourself buying a large tub.

Cinnabon

Type of business: Restaurant

Year founded: 1985

Headquartered: Atlanta, Georgia

How Cinnabon uses scents: It’s hard to pass up the scent of a fresh-cooked cinnamon roll. The smell conjures lazy mornings with the family as well as lick-smacking icing melting into the hot roll. Cinnabon churns out fresh rolls every 30 minutes to keep the cinnamon smell in the air, often keep them warming in the oven to keep the scent alive. 

Stores also prefer to be located in areas of a mall where airflow gets trapped, so the scent lingers, and places its ovens at the front of its stores, which is why you may smell a Cinnabon long before you’ve reached the food court.

Samsung

Type of business: Electronics

Year founded: 1938

Headquartered: Suwon-si, South Korea

How Samsung uses scents: While electronics may not have a scent, that “new equipment” scent you find in Samsung isn’t necessarily the phones and electronic devices. Executives aiming to create a “crisp, sharp and evocative” scent use its signature “Intimate Blue,” a fresh and fruity aroma.

Researchers found these simple smells are instantly recognizable and don’t require our minds to process, so our brains connect immediately. Shoppers encountering simple scents spent 20 percent more than those in stores without fragrances or with more complex mixtures.

Hyatt

Type of business: Hotel

Year founded: 1957

Headquartered: Los Angeles, California

How Hyatt uses scents: When you travel, you want your hotel room to feel like a home away from home. Creating a Zen-like experience for its guests, Hyatt Hotels uses a signature aroma it calls “Seamless.” The scent, used since 2007, blends blueberries, light florals, vanilla and a hint of musk. You’ll find it in Hyatt Place, Hyatt House, Hyatt Regency, Grand Hyatt and Park Hyatt properties.

The North Face

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1968

Headquartered: Alameda, California

How The North Face uses scents: Outdoor outfitter the North Face welcomes enthusiasts seeking camping, hiking and adventure gear. And what better way to invoke the great outdoors than providing a scent meant to smell like Yosemite National Park? Think a blend of cedar and fir trees mixed with earth and water, and you can practically picture yourself using the equipment and clothing surrounding you in the store.

Caesar’s Palace Casino

Type of business: Casino

Year founded: 1966

Headquartered: Paradise, Nevada

How Caesar’s Palace Casino uses scents: Vegas casinos are notoriously smoke-filled spaces, so these businesses needed to make their spaces less pungent, especially for the nonsmoking clientele.

Adding refreshing scents to mask the foul aroma, casino managers found gamblers stayed longer. A 1995 study conducted by the Smell & Taste Treatment and Research Foundation confirmed it: When a casino has a nice smell, visitors gamble 45 percent more.

Next time you walk into Caesar’s Palace, see if you can sniff its signature combination of roses, citrus and forest.

Hilton

Type of business: Hotel

Year founded: 1919

Headquartered: McLean, Virginia

How Hilton uses scents: Hilton Hotels & Resorts add different scents to its properties based on location. For example, Boulders Resort & Spa Scottsdale in Arizona offers a signature mixture of mesquite and shaggy bark juniper to provide the “perfume of the desert.”

Its DoubleTree properties, known for its warm chocolate chip cookies at check-in, know the smell of cookies provides a homey ambiance to its lobbies. (Plus, you get a cookie!)

Hilton’s CleanStay program uses Lysol and Dettol so rooms have a just-been-cleaned smell for discerning guests concerned about cleanliness.

IKEA

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1943

Headquartered: Delft, Netherlands

How IKEA uses scents: While shoppers at IKEA are looking for affordable furnishing that won’t come with any instruction on how to piece it together, they also know cinnamon rolls and Swedish meatballs are high on the day’s agenda. Would you even know the big-box retailer offered food if it wasn’t for the use of its scent marketing techniques that send these popular food aromas into the air? The reason for it is that shoppers will spend more if they are hungry.

Home Depot

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1978

Headquartered: Atlanta, Georgia

How Home Depot uses scents: Ah, the smell of fresh-cut wood. That’s how you know you’ve stepped into a Home Depot. But how often do you hear saws whirling when picking up paint and DIY tools for house projects? You guessed it: That lumber smell is pumped into the space and invokes a can-do attitude.

Lowe’s

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1961

Headquartered: Mooresville, North Carolina

How Lowe’s uses scents: Not to be outdone by its competitor, Lowe’s does the same.

Nike Store

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1964

Headquartered: Beaverton, Oregon

How Nike Store uses scents: You’re 84 percent more likely to buy running shoes at Nike when floral scents remind you of taking a jog outside than not. At least, that’s what scientists discovered when they watched customers in both settings. Nike was smart enough to listen.

New Balance

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1906

Headquartered: Boston, Massachusetts

How New Balance uses scents: It wasn’t florals but a combination of wood and leather that New Balance used when the shoe manufacturer opened in China. The brand wanted to convey the high craftsmanship of Chinese shoemakers when introducing the American brand. The scent was so successful that shoppers spent double that of shoppers in competing stores.

Disney World Resort

Type of business: Amusement Park

Year open: 1971

Headquartered: Orlando, Florida

How Disney World Resort uses scents: The magic of Disney is a work of art. Imagineers and designers have worked hard to make sure guests of the theme park have a practically perfect (in every way) time. That includes scents. Its patented “scent blending” is used to enhance rides and entertainment so that every sense is touched when experiencing a moment.

Dunkin Donuts

Type of business: Restaurant

Year founded: 1950

Headquartered: Canton, Massachusetts

How Dunkin Donuts uses scents: Dunkin is more than its coffee, arguably considered the drink of choice in New England. But its donuts differentiate it from its competitors. If a fresh dozen frosted or jelly treats aren’t baking, aroma spritzers shoot off the smell of fresh-baked goodness. 

The brand even went so far as to create a “Flavor Radio” that sprayed its coffee scent into South Korean public transport locations. Whenever an ad for Dunkin would play, the scent would be released to provide passengers with a double-triggering whammy.

Clear Channel Billboards

Type of business: Marketing

Year founded: 1901

Headquartered: San Antonio, Texas

How Clear Channel Billboards uses scents: Flavor Radio is not the only ad that captures the eyes and the nose. Billboards are beginning to emit scents to coincide with the advertisements people see while walking down a street. For example, when L’Oréal’s ad for shampoo displays, a cherry fragrance can be released.

Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport

Type of business: Airport

Year opened: 1952

Headquartered: Phoenix, Arizona

How Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport uses scents: Hanging out at the airport is never fun. It’s a place we have to go to get from Point A to Point B, and when we get delayed, it can be torture. Airports hoping to provide a more enjoyable space are doing so with scents. At Phoenix Sky Harbor, pleasant aromas are even pumped into airport shuttle busses to offset gas fumes.

Singapore Airlines

Type of business: Airline

Year founded: 1972

Headquartered: Singapore

How Singapore Airlines uses scents: It’s not just airports but the scents found on airplanes, as well. Singapore created its “Stefan Floridian Waters” scent in 1990 and still features it in the hot towels flight attendants hand out before a flight. The attendants also wear it as perfume, so the scent lurks throughout the duration of your trip.

Pleasant smells have been found to improve moods by 40 percent, so customers can have a more enjoyable flight.

Ford Motor Company

Type of business: Automotive

Year founded: 1903

Headquartered: Detroit, Michigan

How Ford Motor Company uses scents: Forget the new-car smell, which Ford sprays inside its used cars, the Detroit automaker is now spraying gas scents into electric vehicles. The newest scent marketing strategy for the car and truck manufacturer is being used to show potential customers that they won’t miss a thing if they go electric. 

Showrooms and new cars also feature the signature “Essence of Ford” scent, in use for more than 40 years.

Pandora

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1982

Headquartered: Baltimore, Maryland

How Pandora uses scents: To ensure customers linger in its jewelry store, Pandora uses ambient scents and often changes them when promoting new collections.

Pandora Shine, for example, received its own signature scent in 2018. Studies have shown customers in scented areas perceive the space as more luxurious than those unscented.

Kentucky Fried Chicken

Type of business: Restaurant

Year founded: 1952

Headquartered: Louisville, Kentucky

How Kentucky Fried Chicken uses scents: It’s hard to resist the smell of fried chicken, especially when it’s finger-lickin’ good. Yet Kentucky Fried Chicken doesn’t rely solely on the chicken it’s cooking to lure you in. It, too, uses scent marketing to extend beyond its doors and make you want a drumstick. 

The scent is so popular that the fast-food chain has mimicked its Extra Crispy Chicken smell in products from summer sunscreen to logs for the fire. A public relations gimmick? Sure, but it worked, and the products sold out as quickly as you could say KFC.

Bath & Body Works

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1990

Headquartered: New Albany, Ohio

How Bath & Body Works uses scents: When you sell fragrances, scent-filled lotions, and bath and body items, it’s easy to add scent marketing to stores worldwide. Staffers burn branded candles and spray perfume to keep scents in the air for shoppers.

LUSH

Type of business: Retail

Year founded: 1995

Headquartered: Poole, United Kingdom

How LUSH uses scents: Alternatively, cosmetic retailer LUSH uses an exhaust system to help remove some of the potency of the many aromas found in its stores. This makes it easier for shoppers to hone in on different fragrances to find those they prefer.

Westin Hotels & Resorts

Type of business: Hotel

Year founded: 1930

Headquartered: White Plains, New York

How Westin uses scents: Another hotel brand with properties around the world, Westin properties use a white tea fragrance as its signature scent. Guests can even buy diffusers and candles to take the scent home and keep a luxury vacation vibe going.