Would You Like Music And Sugar With That?
Posted by Dana Suzanne on 03.16.2004
Starbucks Will Now Be Selling CD's Along With Coffee
On Tuesday, Starbucks will launch the Hear Music Café in Santa Monica, Calif., where customers can listen to more than 250,000 online songs on headphones for free. Should they choose to buy them, in any variation, they can have custom CDs made on the spot. The price: $6.95 for five songs and $1 for each additional tune, reports Jefferson Graham of usatoday.com.
Starbucks will expand the service to 10 Starbucks stores in Seattle next month and roll it out to 2,500 stores over the next two years.
"It would be sad if the only way to discover music was home, alone in your room, on your PC," says Don MacKinnon, Starbucks vice president of music and entertainment.
"The traditional model is walking into the store and knowing what you want. We're trying to turn that model on its head by helping people discover new music," he says.
Starbucks is no stranger to the music business. Light jazz and soft rock play in most locations, and the company sells its own private-label CDs in its stores.
With the new download service, Starbucks customers will be able to sample the musical offerings on slim, laptop-like computers from Hewlett-Packard. The tablet PCs will be encased in glass and unmovable.
To purchase music, customers will walk up to a music "bar" and order from a "barista," who will deliver the CD when it's completed.
H-P is providing the PCs, CD burners, printers and servers for the venture. "This is a great way to introduce people to the digital, mobile lifestyle," says Felice Swapp, H-P's director of strategic initiatives.
Apple dominates online digital music with its highly successful iTunes Music Store. Wal-Mart, MusicMatch, a revived Napster, Buymusic.com and MusicNow also have entered the market. Online stores from Sony and Microsoft are expected later this year.
Digital music is projected to grow from $256 million in downloads this year to $2.1 billion in 2007, according to market tracker Forrester Research.
Starbucks isn't the only company trying to bring digital music to retail customers. Last week, Richard Branson's Virgin empire announced an online download service, which will make its debut in August and will feature custom downloads at Virgin retail stores.
"This is what CD retailers will have to do," says Phil Leigh, an analyst with online newsletter Inside Digital Media. "Bring a social environment to the experience."
Source: Graham, Jefferson "Starbucks to put digital music on its menus" usatoday.com
15 March 2004
