Givaudan enters “multisensorial creative territory” with neuroscience-based platform for fragrances

13 Feb 2023 --- Leveraging synergies between its consumer insights pool and neuroscience research, Givaudan has unveiled “Well&Be,” a platform that assists with the creation of emotional product experiences for consumers. Its main utility aids with fragrance design, while matching scent compositions with complementary product features, such as packaging colors, based on specifically targeted moods and emotions.

Based on an understanding of “sensorial congruence,” Well&Be is described by the fragrance house as “addressing the depths and layers of human emotion in a diverse, inclusive and fast-evolving culture of well-being.”

“The uniqueness of Well&Be marks a step forward together with our clients in the well-being journey across product categories,” remarks Verena Nikoleyczik, global head of development, consumer products.

Givaudan highlights that 73% of consumers think a fragranced product should provide a mental escape.“Through this exceptional consolidation of expertise in decoding emotions, fragrance design and sensorial perception, Givaudan inaugurates a diversified response to consumer needs, enabling our perfumers to craft superior creations of high emotional value.”

“Well&Be brings our clients closer than ever to consumers’ emotions, offering a truly memorable product experience,” she adds.

Fragrance as a mental escape
In a global context, Givaudan highlights that 64% of consumers consider themselves to work in an “always on” culture causing physical and mental stress, and where 73% think a fragranced product should provide a mental escape.

Well&Be draws upon Givaudan’s consumer intelligence and digital innovation, including two AI platforms – Myrissi & MoodScentz+ – to allow product creation to reach its fullest potential.

The Myrissi platform generates a visual mood board and “verbal ecosystem” surrounding any fragrance. From packaging to campaign storytelling, the consumers’ emotional nuances are translated in their “most complete and consistent form,” according to Givaudan.

Myrissi can either start by analyzing the chemical composition of a scent to predict its associated color palette – or work in the reverse by studying a base color palette to identify its “olfactive affiliation.”

MoodScentz is a platform that helps perfumers and oral care flavorists create compositions that enhance emotions, covering a range of moods such as “Relax & Unwind,” “Invigorate & Recharge” and “Happy & Blissful.” It covers an extensive olfactive palette supporting all product categories and measures real-time emotional response using the company’s InSituScanz brain-imaging capability.

Identifying key mood and emotional archetypes
Well&Be covers a territory of 92 moods and emotions structured around five archetypes.

Givaudan highlights that 75% of the emotions people experience every day are triggered by smell.The first archetype “The Nostalgic” helps consumers to “feel good through childhood reminiscence.” The second, “The Transformer,” helps consumers “feel good through self-achievement and transcendence.”

“The Connector” helps consumers reap the wellbeing benefits of connecting with others. “The Seeker” elicits a “taste for discovery and escapism.”

Finally, “The Naturalist” addresses the consumer need to foster a good connection with nature.

Well&Be is Givaudan’s latest among a string of developments in scent creation, as it recently outlined a US$5.5 billion sales growth accelerated by fragrance innovation.

The Swiss company previously partnered with China-based Tmall Innovation Centre to launch Creatogether, an AI-powered human-to-machine co-creation service for customers to “realize” their olfactory vision in the Chinese e-commerce market.

Givaudan is also currently in a partnership with LanzaTech to convert carbon emissions into sustainable ethanol for use in fragrances.

Demand for mood-boosting scents
Givaudan highlights that 75% of the emotions people experience every day are triggered by smell, broadening the commercial viability of mood-boosting scents. Research into the scent-wellness axis has been gaining ground among fragrance houses in recent years.

Last December, Firmenich unveiled a range of fragrances branded Focus, powered by EmotiCODE. The scents are based on the first patent-pending perfume design rules demonstrated to give consumers the benefit of improved focus and help them get into a state of flow.

In other moves, beauty giant L’Oréal partnered with bio-informatics and technology company Emotiv to design a wearable headset device for helping consumers create their personalized fragrance, resulting in a “perfect scent” to match their mood.

L’Oréal found that more than 77% of consumers want fragrances that bring emotional benefits. It also found that people tie emotions to their scent preference via a blind test. Additionally, more than half of the consumers aged between 12 and 34 choose fragrances based on their mood.

By Benjamin Ferrer