Taking It To The Streets: Moving Scent Research Out Of The Lab

Abstract

With a recent surge of interest in the impact of scent on consumers, the trade press and the popular press have been at odds with the academic community regarding the effectiveness of scent in influencing purchase decisions.  Academic research has provided scant confirmation of the beliefs, widely accepted throughout industry, that the use of scent has vast power to influence purchase decisions.  The bulk of the academic literature has addressed effects other than purchase, and has taken place in the lab, sometimes in “simulated stores.” Most retailers, however, are more concerned with actual sales performance in real stores than with theories about cognitive processes and mediating variables associated with smell and consumer decision making.  The growing disparity between popular wisdom and research findings has lead researchers to call for greater collaboration with practitioners and more studies conducted in the field, in a variety of store types, rather than the lab.  Shifting research from the controlled lab environment to the field, with its myriad of uncontrollable factors, however, presents special challenges to the researcher which, if ignored, may threaten to invalidate findings regardless of their apparent significance.  Following is one account of the difficulties connected with attempting to close the gap between the field and the lab, with implications for researchers and retailers, and recommendations for future research.