Can you smell it? It’s that time of the year when Christmas is in the air! Oh, lift your face and smell the scent of fir trees, pine cones, fresh cold air, and KFC fried chicken in the air! Wait, what, KFC fried chicken in the air? That’s become a Christmas scent?
Yes, KFC decided that Christmas needs more food smells, particularly its famous fried chicken with 11 herbs and spices. To that end, the company recently sold out of its five-pound fire logs that were scented with fried chicken. Relax though, no chickens were harmed and none are burned as part of the fire logs, which are made out of recycled materials. The logs burn up to 2.5 to 3 hours and have a caution applied – burning it may result in a crazing for fried chicken (plus it may attract hungry bears or neighbors).
KFC isn’t the only company applying scents to the holidays. General Mills is also using scents in movie theaters to entice consumers for its Pillsbury cinnamon rolls. General Mills is using scent machines at 200 theaters to push out a subtle scent of freshly cooked cinnamon rolls during pre-show commercials.
Why the emphasis on scents in marketing? Studies have indicated that smell is strongly linked to memory recall. Consumers link scents to memories, making them more inclined to purchase products that generate happy memories.
What smells do you like?
Group Activities and Discussion Questions:
- Poll students: What are the scents of Christmas?
- Show the KFC yule log site: https://www.kfc.com/fire-log
- Show a video about KFC logs: https://youtu.be/b-4Yh8_4vZI
- Show the Pillsbury cinnamon theater commercial: https://youtu.be/z_ie4wdXyXM
- Divide students into teams.
- Have each team develop a marketing tactic using “scents” to improve branding and sales.
- What are the drawbacks to this type of marketing?
Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune, Entrepreneur, Ad Week, Fox News, other news sources
