When did pine cones start smelling like cinnamon?

[hedgehog]

Why did pine cones start smelling like cinnamon?

Do you think that "cinnamon" smell is apt to kill you if you breathe too much of it?

[JaneyVee]

1. Thanks, Obama.

[Xipe Totec]

2. Dunno. But if you start smelling burnt wires you may be having a stroke. nt

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. After Thanskgiving.

Before that, they smelled of pumpkin spice.

[liberal_at_heart]

4. It's marketing. I don't even think they are trying to get you to buy the pine cones.

I think it is to put you in the shopping mood so you will buy more stuff when you're inside the store.

[jmowreader]

18. Which explains why they're not kept inside the store

Think about it: you see these things sold at crafts stores, supermarkets etc., and they are always displayed outside. People buy the fuck out of these.

[enlightenment]

5. I'll take excessive cinnamon

to excessive "French Vanilla" wafting off of everything.

It does make me long for the days when pine smelled like . . . pine.

[louis-t]

20. I HATE the smell of phony vanilla.

My God, people plug those oily, smelly Glade things in their wall socket where I work and it gets in the ventilation and stinks up the whole place. To top it off, one of the staff ladies wears cologne that smells like phony vanilla. Real vanilla actually smells nice.

[enlightenment]

24. I agree.

Whole-nosedly!

[PeoViejo]

6. When the smell of Pine Cone just wasn't enough

Next Year they will smell like Prime Bud.

[olddots]

7. ah the smell of the food court

And the feel of nagahyde

[KT2000]

8. Awful - just awful

they place them next to the pattern books in the fabric store - had to leave because it was too much.
My grocery store has them inside the door during the holidays too. I'm just sure that stuff will kill a person.

[Wella]

9. "Why the Smell of Cinnamon Makes You Spend Money"

Why the Smell of Cinnamon Makes You Spend Money
http://ideas.time.com/2011/12/16/why-the-smell-of-cinnamon-makes-you-spend-money/

...I was astounded by my behavior. After all, I’m a 41-year-old man who’s long since stopped believing in Santa Claus. So what was it that led me to this neat pile of cards ready to be mailed a good six weeks before Christmas? In my attempt to understand, I went over the details of the days leading up to my own personal Christmas frenzy, and I tracked the origins of it back to a brief window of time as I changed flights in the Zurich airport. I noticed the duty free shops were already full of the colors of Christmas. There was a ginormous tree topped by a gleaming star, surrounded by images of Santas and reindeer and sleighs. But surely it would take more than clichéd icons to turn me into a Christmas zombie?

Not having anything else to go on, I investigated further. Turns out I was on the right path, for the truth of the matter was to be found in the mechanisms behind the displays. To be more precise, carefully camouflaged tubes strategically placed amongst the tinsel and glitz were piping in the sumptuous smells of Christmas: a perfect mix of cinnamon and pine.

Although it seemed I’d gotten to the nub of the issue, I was still perplexed. I mean, can a tube dispensing cinnamon and pine really compel me to embrace the Christmas spirit way ahead of time? Surprisingly, yes. Dr. Gemma Calvert, who is an expert in modern brain imaging based in Oxford, England, discovered the remarkable ability smells have to reactivate childhood memories. She exposed a group of volunteers to cinnamon and then viewed their reactions, using an fMRI scanner. As they breathed in the sweet spicy scent, their brains fired up — including the region responsible for authentic emotional engagement. It seems cinnamon is one of the main ingredients associated, over time, with baking and cider-making rituals and can kick-start an emotional journey whenever it wafts our way.

So while it might seem as though retailers are concentrating on everything that delights your eyes and ears, they also might be surreptitiously enticing you to buy more through your nose. And they might not even be doing it in a sneaky manner. This season, Trader Joe’s, Publix, and other supermarkets are prominently displaying heavily-scented “cinnamon brooms” by the check out — large, smelly bunches of twigs to hang inside your home and anoint with cinnamon oil when their pungency starts to fade. At Bed, Bath and Beyond, Home Depot, and other big-box stores, cinnamon-scented pine cones for sale greet you as you walk in the door. Take these items home and you might even get the urge to rush out shopping again. Christmas is in the air — quite literally!

[liberal_at_heart]

10. exactly.

[hedda_foil]

14. I bought one of those cinnamon brooms last year because it smelled so nice in Trader Joe's.

When I got it home I realized that the scent that seemed rather mild in the store was totally overwhelming in my condo. I wound up leaving it on my patio for the rest of that miserable winter.

[Wella]

15. Good to know. I had felt bad that I didn't have the money last year to buy one of them

Very tough year financially. Now, I'm glad I didn't have the extra funds. Thanks!

[Hekate]

17. Awesome -- truly awesome

Part of me just wants to LOL

[louis-t]

21. People go to college to learn this stuff.

If they could get away with hypnotizing you at the door and getting you to drop your wallet and leave the store, they would.

[Wella]

23. That's their ultimate dream, my friend.

[gollygee]

11. I can't express how much I hate those

I hate when they put them in their vestibule and you have to breathe in that horrible air on your way in and out. It is overpowering.

[bettyellen]

16. i begged the manager to move them from the entrance, and now they spend their days outside the

entrance! The workers there are happier now too!

[Rex]

12. Why do fast food places use red and orange in their designs?

Marketing...billions of dollars are spent each year to figure out how to get people to do things subconsciously. And it works.

[Orrex]

13. My grocery store has a gantlet of scented pine cone displays at the entrance.

I can barely make it into the store without passing out from the overwhelming redolence of it!

[LiberalElite]

19. Wonder if this would help if they

were put in Human Resources when it's raise time?

[hedgehog]

22. Don't forget, Scrooge comes out at Christmas time, too!