TASTE IS MEMORY. MARKETING IS EMOTION

Taste is habit shaped by history. Sell the memory — not just the meal.

JUST A THOUGHT

I never developed a taste for Nutri — the soy-based dish that’s popular across Indian homes.Why? It wasn’t around when I was growing up in India. My subconscious never registered it as food, much less comfort.

No emotional attachment, whatsoever.

Turns out, I’m not alone in this

When Nestlé failed to crack the Japanese coffee market, it wasn’t pricing or packaging that stood in the way.It was childhood.

They discovered that adults don’t fall in love with new tastes — they fall in love with familiar emotions.And in Japan, coffee wasn’t one of them.

The solution? Coffee-flavored candies for children.Start young. Build associations. Sell the emotion, not the bean.

People don’t buy taste. They buy memory.

— Outrageously Yours

SOME REFLECTIONS

The Subconscious Roots of Taste

• Food preferences are often rooted in childhood exposure.

• If something wasn’t available or emotionally tied to early experiences, it often feels foreign or uninviting later in life — no matter how nutritious or popular it becomes.

That’s why Nutri (soya chunks) may never feel like “home food” to you — even though it’s a staple now.

The Nestlé–Japan Coffee Story

• Nestlé struggled in Japan not because of pricing or marketing, but because coffee lacked nostalgia.

• French consultants helped Nestlé see that early emotional conditioning was missing.

• Their strategy: Introduce coffee at the childhood level — through candies, desserts, and school-related associations.

It’s not just selling coffee — it’s building generational memory.

3. The Deeper Marketing Lesson: Emotional Embedding

Brands succeed when they don’t just sell a product — but embed it into people’s early lives, rituals, and relationships.

That’s what Maggi did in India. What Nutella did in Europe. What Coca-Cola did in America.

The trick isn’t to market to adults — it’s to raise the next generation of loyalists.