The magazine Media & Marketing ran a few features on Brands and Music in their February issue that are worth a read, including some thoughts from citizensound. Also published within the magazine was an article I wrote on the sound of retail environments.

citizensound carried out an extensive survey at the end of 2007 early 2008 in London and Paris on the sound of (physical) retail. We checked out nearly 100 stores in the two cities to see (or rather hear) whether brands have fully leveraged the power of sound at retail.

Unfortunately, the results were not positive. A few companies had developed an outstanding approach to creating soundscapes that added to the shopping experience. Paul Smith had brilliantly fused music selection with each collection throughout the store, thus combining the senses as people explored the shop. However, this is the exception rather than the rule.

Music is often dictated by store staff for their own enjoyment, rather than what will connect with consumers. I walked into four different mobile phone stores and the music was interchangeable RnB. The staff were happy but the consumers were not all RnB fans.

If you are going to be in the store all day helping customers, then great music can help the day go by. Let’s be honest, time can drag if you are faced with either few customers or ones that don’t want to talk to you. So the sound of the store needs to also be motivational for the staff as much as for the customers. Which leads me to Top Shop / Top Man.

Here is a store that smartly fuses fashion with music through the layout of the store and the collections themselves. Bands could/do walk in, pick the look as laid out in the store,

So you would think that the store would be bang on the money when it comes to the music played in store. Wrong!

The music sounded fresh, very ‘indie/new wave’. However, when we asked two staff members about the music, we were met with strong responses. Both staff said the music is organised by main office (one thought that Q magazine was also involved) and that the same music had been playing in store for four months straight, same tape, same loop for four months! Also the same music is chosen for Top Shop and Top Man, so little by way of any gender segmentation analysis going on here. For the sanity of the staff, you have to hope this has been changed and that a more rapid changeover of music is happening in store. Just as the Top Shop collections are inspired by designer labels, so can they also gain from bespoke approach to sonic retail by Paul Smith.

citizensound says:

The balance between music for staff and music for consumers is a tricky one. However, getting it right can lead to an environment where the staff and consumer both enjoy their surroundings. This has to be the goal. It is a shame that so many stores fail to recognise this.So many reasons why, but one is money.

More on this subject in Rant 2 on Sonic Retail.