Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts

Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by xg15 on Monday February 25, 2019 @03:53PM (#19249353)

> They did not like this. For whatever reason, which they refused to explain to me, they insisted I played their stupid mix that had been playing for months.

Could licensing have been the reason? Not sure about the US, but in Europe, you frequently need a separate license to play songs in stores, bars or really any kind of public venue. I imagine this is probably even stricted in the US. So the crappy mix might have been the only thing they had bothered buying licenses for - and they might have been afraid to get sued when playing anything else.

I still can feel the pain though, and I have no idea why the bosses didn't even bother to give a reason. So I guess quitting was the best thing to do.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by ravenstine on Monday February 25, 2019 @05:58PM (#19250320)

That's probably the reason if corporate were asked, and I probably would have understood if they told me. The 18 year old me took my boss's "because I say so" attitude as a reason to be defiant.

My main boss was pretty miserable but loved ordering people around like he was the king. He once tried to convince me to go to a conference about cell phones, on my own time and my own money, because... I don't know, I guess he thought I needed to know more about the devices I was selling. I never had problems selling phones to people or helping people with issues, so of course I didn't do it.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by anigbrowl on Monday February 25, 2019 @04:47PM (#19249779)

It could well have been, but the reality is that most middle managers have no idea why such decisions are taken and just try to assert them mindlessly using their managerial authority. People like that aren't worth the trouble it takes to deal with.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by ethbro on Monday February 25, 2019 @06:47PM (#19250624)

The term middle manager in any low-wage, high-churn corporate retail environment is a joke.

Because why would you empower someone to fix problems, when you can give them just enough authority to act as a glorified day care overseer and only pay them a couple bucks more than their employees?

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by empath75 on Monday February 25, 2019 @03:55PM (#19249370)

A friend of mine made more money from licensing a single song to Armani stores than he made from the entire rest of his sales put together.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by alehul on Monday February 25, 2019 @04:03PM (#19249438)

Now that you've pointed out that this process exists, I'm super intrigued to hear the playlists of different stores and compare that with the brand image of said stores.

Maybe if I like 'x' brand, I'll also enjoy their store playlist... could be the key to finding lots of great music.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by reaperducer on Monday February 25, 2019 @04:12PM (#19249500)

Maybe if I like 'x' brand, I'll also enjoy their store playlist... could be the key to finding lots of great music.

It actually is. My wife has the sort of job where she spends a lot of time in high-end retail stores, and at that level the music is very important so she's very aware of it.

It's not just selecting the right music, but making sure your company isn't playing the same songs as the competition.

CBS Sunday Morning had a nice long piece about this last year.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by sverige on Monday February 25, 2019 @11:15PM (#19251930)

I stayed at the W hotel in Chicago on a business trip once years ago. The music sampler they provided was like listening to some mix made from my wife's playlist. So yeah, I don't plan to take her to the W, or that will be the only place suitable for the rest of my life. It's pricey and they have expensive stores all around it.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by chipotle_coyote on Monday February 25, 2019 @06:26PM (#19250486)

Sort of ironically given the linked article's subject, Starbucks used to take music very seriously, to the point of selling CDs in store, setting up CD burning kiosks, and even running their own record label in partnership with jazz/folk label Concord. (There were even standalone Hear Music stores for a few brief years.)

https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/02/st...

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by voltagex_ on Monday February 25, 2019 @07:45PM (#19251045)

https://archive.org/details/attentionkmartshoppers - not quite what you're after but fascinating nonetheless.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by eps on Tuesday February 26, 2019 @05:20AM (#19253218)

I happen to own an oddity in a CD form called Pottery Barn Mix. Mostly jazz/lounge remixes, similar to Verve Remixed. It is really quite nice... except for the disk title :)

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by yarovoy on Monday February 25, 2019 @10:50PM (#19251843)

I actually often go to one chain because I always pick up one or two nice new songs while shopping, and I like their clothes.

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Re:Starbucks' music is driving employees nuts by jrnichols on Monday February 25, 2019 @04:01PM (#19249425)

I agree it could have been a licensing thing. ASCAP representatives have been well known to send shakedown letters to businesses that haven't paid their BMI/ASCAP dues, and lawsuits can be very very expensive.

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