Smelled any good airports lately?
— -- Next time you go to the airport, take a good, deep breath.
What does it smell like? Cinnamon rolls? Barbecue? Cigarette smoke? A locker room? Nothing?
Airports in North America have been doing a lot lately to make the travel experience more enjoyable by upgrading shops, dining venues, and the furniture and lighting in gate areas, and by adding artwork, power plugs and wireless Internet access. Even the TSA is trying to do its part by setting up self-select lanes to help calm things down at security checkpoints around the country.
It's a step in the right direction. But as far as I can tell (or smell), few airports are focusing on their smell, or at least talking about it.
One that is: the UK's East Midlands Airport. The single terminal airport, located about an hour and a half north of London, serves about six million passengers a year. Two years ago the terminal underwent a major renovation that included upgrading shops and restaurants. But Sales and Marketing Manager Sarah Fletcher didn't think upgrading the look of the facility was enough. She wanted the airport to smell better as well.
Sniff your way to sales?
It wasn't as if travelers were steering clear of the airport because it was stinky or anything like that. Fletcher says it was just that, as the 2008 holiday season was approaching, the airport had run out of wall space to decorate or use to communicate with passengers and the staff was intent on creating a pleasant ambience in the airport. "We realized," says Fletcher, "that one thing we could do was send Christmas up the passengers' noses."
Fletcher contacted ScentAir, a large scent marketing company headquartered in Charlotte. The company's worldwide roster of clients includes grocery stores and restaurants, hospitals, hotels (i.e. Hilton, Hyatt, Westin), stores such as Macy's, Nordstrom and Jimmy Choo Shoes, spas, amusement parks and even the U.S. military. To choose an appropriate aroma for the East Midlands airport, Fletcher and several staff members went shopping in ScentAir's scent library. "I told them I was looking for a holiday smell to start people off on their journey. After a day of testing scents, we settled on a cinnamon/Christmas smell."
Using special scent-diffusers, the scent was piped into the airport for the 2008 holiday season. Now the airport is sending out a fresh scent for the spring and summer travel season that smells like coconut, almond and suntan oil. "It's really about the customer experience," says Fletcher, "As people go through security it can be a difficult, stressful experience. Now, as they walk through security, the smell relaxes them and puts them in the frame of mind that this is where their holiday journey begins."
It's not just travelers setting off on their journeys who experience the scent program at East Midlands airport. The smell of chocolate chip cookies being baked wafts through the baggage claim area. "It's subtle, not overpowering," says Fletcher, "We're hoping travelers will feel welcome and at home, but also a bit thirsty and hungry. Then they might fancy something to drink in our coffee shop. It's a little bit crafty but it works."
Wafting our way soon?
Advertising — even advertising that looks like artwork — is one thing, but is scenting the air at an airport a bit too manipulative? "Not any more manipulative than using pleasant lighting, colors or art on the walls, comfortable furniture or music," claims David Sanger, who works with ScentAir in the UK. "The only difference is that people can try to shut out noise and visual advertisements, but everyone has to breathe."
True. Everyone does have to breathe. So what other airports might be intentionally scenting the air travelers breathe? Sanger says the London Farnborough Airport, which caters mostly to private jets and celebrity passengers and is home to famed Farnborough International Airshow, is sending a soothing green tea and lemongrass scent throughout the terminal.
In the United States, a ScentAir spokesperson cited non-disclosure agreements and would only confirm that the company is working with several U.S. airports and/or airlines in varying capacities. When working with airports, the company develops a signature fragrance that can be "delivered" at the check-in counters and in security areas. (For one international airline, a signature fragrance used in the gate areas and frequent-flier club areas is also spritzed in the airplane cabins between flights.)
When it comes to airport aromas, officials don't reveal much more. A Boston Logan spokesperson says simply that they "do not scent the air, and it is not something we are looking closely at," while an airport employee at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport joked that her airport already had an informal signature scent: "Barbecue!" But at Alabama's Mobile Regional Airport, Marketing Manager Julie Bordes says, "We definitely would consider scenting the air in the terminal but not without research to back-up its effectiveness. The scent would have to be effective at improving the customer experience, through its ability to relax and invigorate."
Other airports and other airlines might want to wake up and smell the terminals. Sarah Fletcher says this past winter retail sales figures at the East Midlands Airport matched those from the year before, despite the sagging economy. And while sales figures can't be officially tied to the airport scent, a general feeling of well-being among travelers and employees might be. Lucy Hobson, a duty manager at the East Midlands Airport says while the airport used to smell "just like a building, nothing more," the new, scented air seems to make both passengers and employees much more relaxed. "And that makes the airport a much better place to work and, overall, a more pleasant place for passengers."
That smells good to me.
Readers: What would you like your airport to smell like? Lilacs or lavender? Freshly popped popcorn or newly- mowed grass? The first day or spring? And do you think you know which U.S. airports are pumping in fragrances? Share your airport scent ideas below.
Harriet Baskas writes about travel etiquette for MSNBC.com and is the author of the airport guidebook Stuck at the Airport and a blog of the same name.