It’s been nearly a full month since the all-new Smellephants on Parade activation soft opened at Magic Kingdom, and we’ve stopped by more than a dozen times over that timeframe to track how the offering has evolved. Since our soft opening initial review, Disney World has added a sticker prize, but something else has caught our attention in recent weeks – it doesn’t really smell.
At a high level, Timothy Mouse is seeking out some Whiff-sistants to help Dumbo find a new act. That’s where you come in. Armed with a map of Storybook Circus, it is your job to roam around and match a scent to an elephant. Of course, the pachyderms are themed to the smell that they represent, so even if you don’t catch a whiff, you should be able to complete the task and collect the prize. The offering is completely free.
The problem, we’ve found, is that the Smellephants don’t really smell like much. We’re told that the scents are distributed roughly every 10 minutes, which essentially makes catching a whiff a matter of luck. Not great for an activation sponsored by a multi-level marketing company built around scent.
During our soft opening review, we said that one of the things we thought would be changed as the offering matured was the strength of the scents. We only smelled about 50% of the elephants during the soft opening, and assumed that the scents would be increased in strength:
Another thing that we think will be changed quite quickly is the strength of the scents. It seems like the scents were purposefully turned down a bit, and will gradually be increased to find a happy medium between being able to actually smell the Smellephants, and not creating a scent that is too overpowering for guests and Cast Members alike.
Instead of turning the scents up, we’ve found that Disney dialed the other direction – making it almost impossible to smell anything. Over the past five visits or so, we haven’t smelled a single Smellephant. It was only while visiting today that we were able to smell two of the eight Smellephants.
In theory, you should be able to stand within 5 feet of the Smellephant and catch a whiff. That’s simply not the case for the majority of guests, and apparently a common complaint. If Scentsy isn’t able to crack the case here with the scent distribution, we’d at least like to see a scent box like they have at the EPCOT Flower and Garden Festival. Overall, while we initially had some praise for the offering (despite the multi-level marketing partnership), things need to change if Smellephants is going to live up to the billing from Disney.
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