A change in tempo

Store Equipment & Design, Nov, 2000 by Marilyn D. Cavicchia

Programmed music is now used by supermarket retailers to appeal precisely to their shoppers and employees, and even to set themselves apart.

Let's take a trip back in time a few decades.

Both inside and out, your store looks just like the competitor down the road. The products you offer are the same, too, so you rely on the window signs and the "aisle of values" to keep shoppers coming in.

Your store manager gets on the microphone to announce a special on canned peas. He hates interrupting the in-store music. "Listen," you've told him. "Don't worry about it. No one really listens to it, anyway." And you're right. The programmed music--instrumental versions of songs whose names you can't remember--is played at a low level. You think of it just as a way to soften the noise of squeaky carts and falling cans.

A lot has changed, hasn't it? And not just in decor and the types of products and services offered. Some programmed music providers say supermarket retailers are looking at music as another tool to help them carve out a niche and keep shoppers happy.

MUSIC AS 'BRANDING'

"A supermarket of today is not the supermarket of the 1970s," says Kenny Kahn, vice president of marketing at Muzak, Charlotte, N.C. Shopping has become "experiential," he says, and supermarkets are picking up tips from nonfood retailers, who have for years considered music an important part of the mix.

"Anybody that's in the retail business is looking at what everybody else is doing," Kahn says. "If you go into a mall today and you see how important music and quality of sound is to the biggest retailers in the world, you try to emulate that in your own business.

To start the branding process, programmed music companies ask retailers detailed questions about their stores and their shoppers, which helps them home in on particular artists and songs. Music can even be chosen to match the store design, according to Gordon Majack, product specialist/global content technology at AEI Music Network, Seattle, which recently merged with DMX Music, Los Angeles. "If they say, 'Well, our environment is very light and airy,' we'll think of the music in those terms," he says.

Many stores have upped the volume of their music, some experts say, so individual songs can be noticed--and discussed. According to Frank Tarantino, owner of Creative Retail Communications, Mount Arlington, N.J., this can improve brand image by fostering interaction. About six months ago Tarantino was shopping and struck up a "Who is this singing?" conversation with a young woman. "I went there for milk and eggs and butter and she went there for, say, cat food," he says. "And here we ended up leaving the store with just a little more pleasant experience than just buying cat food."

Some retailers want the music to change throughout the day as the shopper demographics change. Reid's Fine Foods in Charlotte, N.C., uses a direct satellite system with 120 channels and plays contemporary music during the day and softer music at night. "We have a 12,000-square-foot store and we run 500 people through lunch in an hour-and-a-half period," says owner Chuck Richards. "There's a lot of hustle and bustle. We want the music to be a secondary thing that they hear, but something that's in keeping with their hustle and bustle."

Bill Manson, vice president of business media and advertising at DMX's Atlanta office (his prior company, EMN, was acquired a few months ago by DMX), oversees a custom radio station created especially for the Atlanta division of Kroger Co., Cincinnati. Wednesday is seniors' day at Kroger stores, and most senior citizens shop during the middle of the day, so the satellite-delivered KRGR radio station plays big band music at that time. (See SE&D's next issue for more information on custom radio.)

One advantage clothing retailers have over supermarket retailers when it comes to tailoring the music is that their departments, aimed at specific demographics, are set up so that sound doesn't carry too much from one to the next. "In a department store, you can 'zone' the music so what's playing in juniors is different from women's, which is different from men's, which is different from cosmetics," explains Christy Noel, senior vice president of music programming and brand marketing at DMX. "In a supermarket, you don't necessarily have that ability, because it's one huge area. The challenge there is finding music that will appeal to a broader, wide-ranging demographic."

AVOIDING 'BURNOUT'

"I worked in a restaurant that had a tape service and I knew all the songs and what order they were going to play in," Noel says. "I could start singing the next song before it was even Over." The repetition was so drilled into her head, she says, she would anticipate songs this way even when she wasn't at work.

Traditionally, programmed music has been delivered first on record albums, then cassettes and, more recently, compact discs that generally contain four hours' worth of music. While some retailers may like that a carefully selected song repeats in an eight-hour period or day after day, some programmed music companies acknowledge this can drive store employees over the edge.