The article by Wallpach and Kreuzer (2013) discusses the importance of retrieving embodied brand knowledge not just by using the traditional ways of verbal communication, but stimulating more senses and inviting consumers to express themselves by using metaphors. Brand knowledge develops thanks to brand experiences that involve all the senses and the mind, in a conscious and in a non-conscious way. In the article the researchers present the experience of driving a Renault car, and discuss how every sense can be stimulated simply by rethinking of how was the experience of driving the vehicle. The same example can be done by using any brand-related experience. For example, we can think of the experience of drinking a Lavazza coffee. It involves actively smell and taste because of the coffee aroma and the flavor of a roasted espresso. However, different stimuli can come from the engagement of other senses, such as by touching a hot coffee cup or by looking at its dark color or at the steam that comes out of the cup. Moreover, drinking a Lavazza coffee can make people feeling emotions. I personally associate the brand Lavazza to home, since it is my mom’s favorite one. It can even make people recall their Italian holidays or a particular situation when they were drinking this branded-coffee. Since stimuli can be so many and so different, the researchers decided to create a tool to represent brand knowledge by using Multi-Sensory Sculpting (MSS). The aim of MSS is to stimulate various sense brand experience in order to activate non-conscious, multi-sensory mental brand experience, and allowing consumers to express themselves metaphorically (Wallpach & Kreuzer, 2013). MSS is basically a research method that consists in gathering a small number of respondents, give them a toolkit full of different materials, let them the time to create a sculpture that can represent the brand in their opinion and let them also the time to explain why they chose a specific material. It is also important that some well-trained interviewers can assist the respondents during the explanation, and support them in verbally expressing their embodied knowledge. The article then goes on by showing the results of a MSS experiment about an internationally operating Austrian luxury brand. The total meanings found by this experiment were 21 and some of them were cited by all the respondents, even more than once. This brand was associated for example with “fantasy world”, “fragility”, “tradition” and so on. However, results show also that some respondents agree on the uselessness and unnecessity of the brand. The key finding of the article is the managerial implication of MSS. It can be used for strategic branding processes, identifying a current brand meaning and comparing it to the intended meaning (Wallpach & Kreuzer, 2013). Other than that, it can be a useful tool for monitoring and developing the brand, by changing some of the undesirable meanings. I personally agree that MSS could be implemented by companies in order to have a better understanding of their brand’s strengths and weaknesses, and of the brand image more generally. However, I also think that MSS has some limitation. It is not taking into consideration some personal influences that might not depend on the brand itself. For example, if I have to sculpt the brand “Paris” I will think of the time when someone stole my IPhone, of French people not being able to communicate in any other language other than French and to the person that was with me during that trip (with whom I do not have any good relationship right now). Unfortunately, I have the feeling that bad experiences count more than the good ones, and I am not sure these implications are taken into consideration by MSS. Moreover, I do not know how actual companies could modify their meanings, especially internationally operating companies that exist since many years. On the other side, I can see the potential of implementing such a method in researches regarding brand awareness and its development. For example, MSS could be used by start-ups to understand how the brand is perceived by the first consumers and adopting immediate changes to the intended meanings before expanding. As shown in the website of Multi-Sensory Sculpting ® the applications of this method are listed as strategic brand development, brand monitoring, multi-sensory brand experiences and understanding abstract concepts (Multi-Sensory Sculpting ®). In my opinion, these are all possible applications for start-ups that still do not have strong brands on which to rely, and that could take big advantage in adopting slight changes to their company’s culture, values and image.

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References

• Multi-Sensory Sculpting ®. Applications of Multi-Sensory Sculpting ®. Retrieved from http://www.multisensorysculpting.com/en/applications-of-mss/

• Wallpach, S. von, & Kreuzer, M. (2013). Multi-sensory sculpting (MSS): Eliciting embodied brand knowledge via multi-sensory metaphors. Journal of Business Research, 66(9), 1325–1331. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2012.02.032