Two things matter about the music in your room: getting it right so it works for your customers, and staying on the right side of the rules. These guides cover both, in plain English, with the sources linked, so you can make good calls with confidence. No jargon, nothing to sign up for.
The music is the one part of your venue nobody plans, and it plays to every customer who walks in. Seven mistakes, what the research actually shows about each, including the one piece of advice everybody gives that the evidence does not support.
If somebody keeps reaching for the volume, the problem is usually not the volume setting. It is that the tracks are not the same loudness as each other. What that is, a one shift test to find out whether you have it, and the measured numbers from our own library.
The music in your room decides how long people stay and how the place feels. Here is why a personal playlist quietly works against you, what the research actually shows about dwell time and mood, and what to play instead.
It is easy to assume that paying PPL PRS means you can play anything, Spotify included. There is a gap in that thinking. The honest answer, in plain English, with Spotify's own words and the sources.
Answer six quick questions about how your venue uses music. You get a plain-English summary of where each of your music sources sits, and the exact questions to put to PPL PRS about your own position. Nothing sent anywhere.
PPL PRS publish worked examples and almost nobody reads them. PPL PRS's examples: £364.62 for a pub or bar, £400.81 for a café, £616.24 for a jukebox, and what moves the figure: the audible area, radio against a device, and every extra use stacked on top. Plus the first year surcharge to avoid.
What TheMusicLicence covers, what it actually costs, the "royalty-free" trap, and how to establish your own position with PPL PRS.
How a pub's music bill is really assembled, from background music and TV sport to jukeboxes and live acts, which parts your choice of supplier touches, and which stay exactly where they are.
What TheMusicLicence costs a restaurant in PPL PRS's own figures, the kitchen radio that is easy to forget, music at the tables outside, and the small-restaurant exemption that turns out to be American law.
More guides are on the way, each one answering a real question venue owners ask about the music in their venue. For the full explanation of how SoundPour itself works, see Music licensing.
SoundPour is original background music for UK venues, from morning coffee to last orders, supplied with a written Declaration of Provenance covering your catalogue. Drop us your business name and email and we'll come back to you, usually within 24 hours.
Start your free betaor email us directly: hello@soundpour.co.uk