IOSR Journal of Business and Management (IOSR-JBM) e-ISSN: 2278-487X, p-ISSN: 2319-7668. Volume 21, Issue 6. Ser. II (June. 2019), PP 21-31 www.iosrjournals.org DOI: 10.9790/487X-2106022131 www.iosrjournals.org 21 | Page The Impact of Sensory Branding on Consumer Preference of Coffee Shops in Colombo, Sri Lanka Nadeeja Dodamgoda 1 , Kulani Amarasinghe 2 1 Senior Lecturer of Imperial Institute of Higher Education, Colombo Sri Lanka, Validated Center of University of Wales 2 Postgraduate Candidate of Imperial Institute of Higher Education, Colombo, Sri Lanka, Validated Center of University of Wales Corresponding Author: Nadeeja Dodamgoda Abstract : The modern coffee shop culture is relatively an emerging concept in Colombo, Sri Lanka and a competitive atmosphere has been created over the years. It is discovered that coffee shops are visited by individuals for different purposes including dine-in, take-away food and beverages, studying, socialization, relaxation, and business meetings/ work. Having countless alternative places to fulfill these objectives, preference in coffee shops is a choice made by the consumers, and in contrast a challenge for coffee shop managers to overcome. In building a competitive edge towards uniqueness, coffee shops substantially invest in sensory branding techniques as a value creator. Consequently, the research problem of this study is to identify the impact of sensory branding on consumer preference with regards to choosing coffee shops in Colombo, Sri Lanka over the alternatives for different purposes. The study is conducted as a survey with a sample of 300 coffee shop visitors following a hypothetic deductive approach testing the hypothesis developed based on sensory branding. The results of the study reveal that sensory branding is a successful marketing tool in promoting people to choose coffee shops among other alternatives for purposes such as dining, relaxation, studying and meetings. Key Words: Sensory Branding; Consumer Preference; Coffee Shops --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date of Submission: 24-05-2019 Date of acceptance: 08-06-2019 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I. Introduction Marketing helps building a strong relationship with stakeholders whereas branding is a key element. Branding acts as the promise to a customer which conveys what to expect and its differentiation. Accordingly, marketers concentrate on techniques to stimulate customer senses uniquely, where sensory branding acts as a marketing tool (Lindstrom, 2005). Sensory Branding includes „Marketing techniques that aim to seduce the consumer by using his/her senses to influence feelings and behavior on their preference‟ (American Marketing Association, 2009). Simply, attract and retain the customers using the power of senses. Today, marketers have identified that more senses appealed, stronger the message would be and therefore try to influence through one or more senses; sight, sounds, smell, touch, and taste. The mostly used sense is „sight‟ (visual marketing), highly stimulated by the environment through colors and shapes, for example through the logo and atmosphere. Next, through „sounds‟ (auditory marketing) which makes customers remember the brand. Spence (2003) believe that 75% of the emotions are generated by smell (olfactory marketing), where both natural and artificial smells are used by companies. Taste (gustative marketing) is mainly done through samples, tasting, and making blind-tests. The final sense is the touch (tactile marketing) where customers are attracted by quality and comfort through the materials used. The ten brands that most effectively leverage multiple senses as per Lindstrom (2005) are Singapore Airlines, Apple, Disney, Mercedes Benz, Marlboro, Tiffany, Louis Vuitton, Bang & Olufsen, Nokia and Harley Davidson. Sensory branding is applied in different industries at different levels. Particularly, service industries find it harder as services cannot be touched, tasted, felt or seen, where sensory branding plays a vital role. For example, Singapore Airline uses visual theme consistently, incorporates the same scent (Stefan Floridian Waters) through flight attendants, hot towels, and concentrates on uniforms and appearance of the staff. In Sri Lanka, sensory branding is relatively novel which does not have presence in many industries but seen on the businesses which serve the upper class citizens in Colombo. For example, department stores, top restaurants, franchise businesses, hotels and coffee shops. Particularly, modern coffee shop concept is rather