Does anyone know if the IN-STORE- AUDIO NETWORK includes the choice of an "EASY LISTENING" genre for their piped in music? If so, tell me some of the songs that are played under that format, that you have heard in your store. At our store it is a "mix", but mostly crappy, abrasive, hard-on-the-nerves rock songs from the 80s and 90s along with lots of B-side shrill shrieking divas who can barely sing on-key.
Of the very, very few songs that I hear in our store mix that would qualify as Easy Listening, they might include "You and Me against the World" by Helen Reddy, and "Reunited" by Peaches and Herb. There are tens of thousands of other good, chill-out songs available, but knowing ISAN, they would probably only have a tiny tiny sliver of those kinds of songs, if they even have such a genre available for Kroger stores (??)
The reason I ask is this............. most of the people I see shopping in our store look unhappy (at least more than 50 percent)........worried, stressed, tired, overworked, in pain, unhappy about food prices, in a hurry, distracted, etc. Why play music that is hard on the nerves? It just seems it would lead to more relaxed attitudes and less tension among shoppers, and a better experience all around.
However, admittedly I am prejudiced, in the sense that I prefer background music that is more "positive" "uplifting", "pleasant", "Melody-oriented", "soothing" or what-have-you. Not as popular as the jangled-nerves rock and roll that this cut-throat, neurotic world we live in is evidently SO fond of.
I wish they would turn the music off completely. I like music but I find it too distracting when I'm trying to work. If a song comes on that I like, my attention turns more towards the song instead of the task at hand. I can't listen and work at the same time.
They have been playing the same freaking tape for as long as i can remember. It is mostly 80s and 90s music, and almost every song is a pop song where a woman is whining about something. I hate it and wish they would turn it off. Almost everybody I see in my store brings earbuds and listens to what they like. The customers are not paying attention to the music. They are in looking for groceries and get out. I doubt they even notice it.
Oh really? Your post beautifully illustrates the point that everyone doesn't enjoy the same kind of music. I would much rather listen to 20 people scratching their nails on a chalkboard simultaneously (artfully combined with background noise from a sheet-metal cutting factory) than have to hear the chaoticly unmusical, guitar grinding bedlam / yelling, shrieking banshee demons-from-hell group like the Ramones.
