Feel the senses - taste the berries!

Do you stop and taste the berries on the way to work? 

I do!

We are fortunate to be located on the same block as an abundant mulberry tree. Each day our team takes a stroll and picks a couple sweet berries. It’s routine, I love it but now, I don’t think of it as unique or different to any other day.

When we consider what a visitor may want to experience we often think about what their journey through our destination will look like. In the case of a winery this may be what the visitor will see as they travel to the cellar door and perhaps a greeting from the winemaker.
But what do you as an operator see, do or hear in your every day that the visitor won’t that perhaps, like my mulberry tree, have been taken for granted. And, if a visitor could experience it would make your business and experience truly stand out. Perhaps it's the earthy smell of the fresh oak barrel before the pour or the sound of the birds that come out only at sunrise when you’re sipping your coffee or the soft close as you seal a bottle.

Sensory Experience is the connection of physical senses including sight, touch, taste, sound and smell to an experience. Sensory Experiences build layers of memories in our brains that create an emotional attachment to a place (Sensory Trust, UK). Considering our winery example, the visitor typically may only engage taste and smell with the tasting, but to create a holistic sensory experience the visitor may engage their senses by touching a sample of the grapes from the vineyard. Sensory experiences allow visitors to connect with nature and culture in a personal and unique manner. Incorporating more sensory elements into existing offerings or curating a sensory experience is a great way to improve the value perception of your offering.

Sensory experiences aren’t new and they are well developed in many formats, Via Sensoria located La Cité du Vin in France is a sensory tasting journey in the form of a one-hour tour of the four seasons, the experience is run by a sommelier showcasing four wines from around the world. Beyond taste, the experience features multiple rooms replicating images and sounds of nature and specially created poems to connect their visitors to the season and lands of the wine they are tasting.

Sensory experiences aren’t just for purpose built venues and don’t require a great deal of work or investment to get started, Forest, Byron Bay integrate simple sensory elements into their dining experience. When you order their line-caught fish you’d be delighted to hear the chef smokes the fish with paperbark collected daily from their very own forest. This small but powerful sensory concept is captured in the story telling of the wait staff when presenting the menu and followed through by the chefs in the preparation and plating.

Tourism Australia’s Future of Demand highlights sensory as one of the seven experience sectors, capturing an audience that enjoys food, drink, sightseeing and culture. Traveller types looking to immerse themselves in a sensory experience include: Exploration, Reconnection and Into Nature. These travellers are all looking to feel something, be it new, thrilling or different. Sensory experiences are a key to unlocking this feeling for all behavioural types whether it be engaging the environment, connecting with their family in nature or discovering something new or exciting.

There are two paths to this endeavour, first is the bolstering of your existing tourism offering with sensory elements to further engage and connect your to your product.
The second is the curation of a premium sensory experience that will surprise and delight your visitor creating sensory memories that will bring them back again and again. 

Technology will further enhance sensory experiences through digital senses and those at the forefront of this development have coined the name “The Internet of Senses”. The concept is that in time we will have the ability to share all senses via the digital world. Imagine being able to taste or smell wine before visiting a winery!

So ask yourself, do you stop and taste the berries? And, remember what might be ordinary to you, can be extraordinary to a visitor. Stop, smell the roses, the coffee, or in my case the berries, close your eyes and soak in the sensation. Then, build this into your experience, creating a true point of difference to drive visitation and ultimately sales.