The Story

Do you associate an aroma with your favorite restaurant, coffee shop, bakery…or your bank or credit union?

I went to Jim and Patty’s coffee shop the other day (some of you may remember Jim and Patty Roberts as the founders of Northwest chain Coffee People) – not for a cup of coffee, but for a slice of coffeecake. Now, don’t get me wrong, their coffee is great, but their coffeecake is spectacular. They have maybe 10 different flavors, all freshly baked on site daily, all equally delicious.

It’s the freshly baked onsite daily part that’s really key here…because when I think of this coffee shop, I don’t think about their coffee, or their scones, or their apple pie – I think of their coffeecake because the shop ALWAYS smells of freshly baked, right out of the oven, delicious coffeecake.

Their brand has a scent, and that scent is coffeecake. I know what you’re thinking – it’s a coffee shop, so it should smell like coffee. But, doesn’t every coffee shop smell like coffee? Jim and Patty’s is the only one I know of that smells different. In a town full of small, independent, locally-owned coffee shops, they’re differentiating themselves through their coffeecake. And what goes great with coffeecake? Coffee, of course.

What about your bank or credit union? Do you have a smell that members and customers associate with your branches? Why not? It could go a long ways in building your brand identity. Hotels and airlines figured that out a while ago, why haven’t the bank and credit union marketing folks? Multi-sensory marketing is what it’s all about!

Oh yeah, and did I mention that the coffeecake at Jim and Patty’s is delicious?

This entry was posted on Monday, November 19th, 2007 at 9:54 am and is filed under Bank Branding, Credit Union Branding, Bank Marketing, Experiential Marketing, Credit Union Marketing, Multisensory Marketing and 5 Senses Branding. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.