Mobilising the cultural consumer through the senses : festivals as sensory experiences

This paper presents an analysis of the role of the senses in the discursive construction of consumer anticipation. The context for this analysis is festivals, an area of scholarship dominated by managerial approaches and an under-appreciation of the multi-sensory nature of consumption. Specifically, this paper revolves around a discursive analysis of publically available promotional texts used to market two boutique festivals in the UK: The Secret Garden Party; Harvest at Jimmy’s. The paper demonstrates the visual and textual means by which the festival is conceived as a form of sensory consumption, with the purpose of creating anticipation among festival goers.