That Smell

I stumbled upon this product – Duke Cannon soap – in the grocery store last week. The awesomeness stopped me in my tracks.

The New York Times today describes why most humans are really bad at describing scents. The theory goes that most of us live in relative odor-impoverished environments and therefore our lexicon for smell is correspondingly impoverished. (We often find in our research that the same could be said for taste. What does a lemon taste like? Well, it kind of tastes like a lemon.)

Sometimes in research you can overcome that with metaphorical exploration. In messaging you can do something similar with metaphors, as Duke Cannon has figured out. (“Smells like Naval Supremacy”).  The whole package, not just the description of the scent, tell a unique story about the brand.

(They also have “Duke Cannon Big Ass Beer Soap,” which is made with Old Milwaukee.)