Here's something you might be interested in.
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Smell sells
To Whom It May Concern:
Why can the smell of popped popcorn be smelled farther away than any other food? Is there a fact behind this question, or is it just a phenomenon?
-- JS, San Diego
Oh, there are facts hidden everywhere. The place is crawling with them. They're even in the smell of popcorn, along with a little hucksterism. For something to produce a smell, the odor molecules have to vaporize. The faster they are dispersed, the stronger the smell. And the warmer and moister the environment, the more the scent will linger. (Do air-freshener and pet-odor-killer sales peak in August? We'll get an elf on that question right away.) Given those facts, popcorn has a lot going for it smellwise. Corn pops when water in the kernel turns to steam and explodes the seed coat. So there's your sudden release of odorants in a hot, damp environment. Popcorn is a crowd-pleasing stinkfest.
But maybe you're thinking about popcorn scent in a movie theater or store. Long ago, chemists devised a fake popcorn odor that needs only heat to release it. Add a fan and a ventilation system and you have eager buyers. Chemists can fake pretty much any smell there is, and then somebody uses it to sell us stuff. It's all very sinister. Examples: a scratch-and-sniff gunpowder ad; scented slot machines in Vegas that made people stay longer and spend more; male-sweat-scented bills from collection agencies (increased on-time payments 17 percent); fake new-car smell in a bank's car-loan brochures; and old-fashioned-home-cookin' scent in anything microwavable. The topper might be the Chicago scent-development lab that tested smells to see which got men hottest. Eau de JLo? No! Cinnamon buns, by a landslide. Pure erotica.
And the truth is now out about everybody's favorite, that new-car smell. The real stuff is the scent of volatile chemicals wafting from fresh plastics: toluene, styrene, ethylene glycol butyl esters, benzene, acetone…. A smell to close a sale by. We recommend you drive your new car for the first 1000 miles with the AC on and the doors open.
Here's something you might be interested in.
Smell sells
Smell sells
To Whom It May Concern:
Why can the smell of popped popcorn be smelled farther away than any other food? Is there a fact behind this question, or is it just a phenomenon?
-- JS, San Diego
Oh, there are facts hidden everywhere. The place is crawling with them. They're even in the smell of popcorn, along with a little hucksterism. For something to produce a smell, the odor molecules have to vaporize. The faster they are dispersed, the stronger the smell. And the warmer and moister the environment, the more the scent will linger. (Do air-freshener and pet-odor-killer sales peak in August? We'll get an elf on that question right away.) Given those facts, popcorn has a lot going for it smellwise. Corn pops when water in the kernel turns to steam and explodes the seed coat. So there's your sudden release of odorants in a hot, damp environment. Popcorn is a crowd-pleasing stinkfest.
But maybe you're thinking about popcorn scent in a movie theater or store. Long ago, chemists devised a fake popcorn odor that needs only heat to release it. Add a fan and a ventilation system and you have eager buyers. Chemists can fake pretty much any smell there is, and then somebody uses it to sell us stuff. It's all very sinister. Examples: a scratch-and-sniff gunpowder ad; scented slot machines in Vegas that made people stay longer and spend more; male-sweat-scented bills from collection agencies (increased on-time payments 17 percent); fake new-car smell in a bank's car-loan brochures; and old-fashioned-home-cookin' scent in anything microwavable. The topper might be the Chicago scent-development lab that tested smells to see which got men hottest. Eau de JLo? No! Cinnamon buns, by a landslide. Pure erotica.
And the truth is now out about everybody's favorite, that new-car smell. The real stuff is the scent of volatile chemicals wafting from fresh plastics: toluene, styrene, ethylene glycol butyl esters, benzene, acetone…. A smell to close a sale by. We recommend you drive your new car for the first 1000 miles with the AC on and the doors open.
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