Why We Buy More When the Music Is Slow
What supermarket, restaurant and department store studies say about slow music, longer stays and spending, and why the key of the music matters.
Answer to the question
Does slow music make you spend more?
Often, yes. In studies of supermarkets, restaurants and department stores, slow music went with slower movement, longer stays and higher spending, and time spent was the strongest predictor of money spent in a restaurant. The effect is not fixed: in one department store experiment, slow tempo raised sales only in a minor key.
Key takeaways
- A 38.2 per cent sales difference between slow and fast music is the figure credited to Ronald Milliman's 1982 supermarket study, as reported by Knoferle and colleagues in 2012.
- In a 2002 restaurant study, time spent was the strongest predictor of money spent, which places the clock between the music and the bill.
- In a department store experiment over twelve trading days, slow tempo raised sales by 12 per cent in a minor key, with little difference in a major key.
- In the restaurant study, neither tempo nor musical preference significantly changed how long the meal felt, though preference explained actual time better than tempo.
- Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross, in Your Brain on Art, describe rooms as sensory environments where expectation and measurement can part.
Slow music lifted department store sales by 12 per cent over fast music in one experiment, but only in a minor key. Does slow music make you spend more? Often it does, mainly because slower music goes with a longer stay, and a longer stay is where extra spending comes from. How large the effect is depends on the room, the key of the music and what the business sells.
Slow music keeps people in the room longer
A room is never neutral. Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross build Your Brain on Art on that idea, treating rooms as sensory environments that shape experience and deserve deliberate design. In a public installation of three rooms, visitors wore wristbands that recorded body signals, and many were surprised that their beliefs about which room would suit them best did not match what the sensors recorded. Music is one of the cheapest ways to change a room, and the question for a shop or restaurant is what a change of tempo does to the till.
The clock gives the first answer. A 2002 restaurant study by Clare Caldwell and Sally Hibbert measured the chain link by link: how long diners actually stayed, how long the meal felt, how much they spent, how much they enjoyed it and whether they meant to return. Time spent was the strongest predictor of money spent. That places the clock between the music and the bill, so any music that lengthens a stay can lift spending, and tempo is one of the ways it can do so.
Earlier work found the same lever. In Ronald Milliman's 1986 restaurant study, diners who heard slower music stayed longer, and drink sales were higher under slow music. A restaurant that earns from drinks and dessert gains from lingering. One that earns from filling its tables twice an evening may prefer a faster tempo, the trade-off described in Background Music and Dwell Time.
The figure that made the question famous is older still. Milliman's 1982 supermarket study, published in the Journal of Marketing, varied the tempo of the background music and recorded how fast customers moved through the store and how much they spent. Tempo changed both. The 38.2 per cent sales difference is the figure reported for that work in the 2012 department store study by Knoferle and colleagues.
| Study | Setting | What was measured | What was found |
|---|---|---|---|
| Milliman, 1982 | Supermarket | Pace of shoppers and sales | Tempo changed both; Knoferle and colleagues report a 38.2 per cent sales difference between slow and fast music |
| Milliman, 1986 | Restaurant | Length of stay and purchases | Slower music went with longer stays and higher drink sales |
| Caldwell and Hibbert, 2002 | Restaurant | Actual and felt time, spending, enjoyment | Time spent was the strongest predictor of spending |
| Knoferle and colleagues, 2012 | Three department stores | Hourly sales over twelve trading days | Slow tempo raised sales by 12 per cent in a minor key, with little difference in a major key |
Slow tempo lifted sales only in a minor key
The department store test crossed two features of the music, tempo and mode, and ran for twelve trading days in three stores in Switzerland. Four playlists of 24 songs, each about 90 minutes long, covered slow and fast songs in major and minor keys, with average tempos of roughly 85 and roughly 160 beats per minute. Gross sales were recorded hour by hour. Klemens Knoferle, Eric Spangenberg, Andreas Herrmann and Jan Landwehr found sales 12 per cent greater under slow minor-key music than under fast minor-key music, while tempo made little difference in a major key.
The gain is smaller than the 1982 figure, and the authors put part of the gap down to their controls for weather and for the structure of the data. They did not measure time spent in the store, so the route from tempo to sales stays open, and they name dwell time as the next thing to test.
For a venue weighing slow music, that points to a test and not a rule. Playing slow music in some hours and faster music in others, in the same room, and comparing takings across those hours is the design the department store experiment used. Weather moves the figures too, which is why that study controlled for it. A venue that runs the same comparison on its own floor learns what a figure from another shop cannot say.
A setting changes how the same stimulus is read. Why Your Coffee Tastes Different in a White Cup describes a latte rated less sweet from a white mug, an effect that runs through expectation, and music works through its own cues, the key it is played in among them.
Diners rarely feel the room working
In the 2002 restaurant study, neither tempo nor musical preference significantly changed how long diners felt they had been there, even though preference explained how long they actually stayed better than tempo did. Time moved in the records and not in the diners' sense of it. The clock and the till are a better guide than asking customers why they lingered, because the music may not be what they notice.
Store Atmospherics, the deliberate design of music, light, colour and scent in a venue, treats tempo as one variable among many. Slow music is best understood as a way of changing how long people stay, with spending following the stay when the business sells more to people who linger. Liking matters as well, and liking is partly social: Why the Best Song Does Not Win describes an artificial music market in which listeners followed the choices of earlier listeners.
Enjoyment and intentions to return followed what diners liked to hear. Tempo had no significant effect on either.
Common questions
Does slow music make you spend more?
Often, in the studies reviewed. Slower music went with longer stays and higher drink sales in a restaurant, and the 1982 supermarket study is reported to have found a 38.2 per cent sales difference between slow and fast music. A later department store experiment found a 12 per cent gain from slow music in a minor key and little difference in a major key.
Does the key of the music matter as well as the tempo?
In one department store experiment, yes. Slow tempo raised sales only for music in a minor key, and tempo made little difference in a major key.
Do people notice that music changes how long they stay?
In a 2002 restaurant study, neither tempo nor musical preference significantly changed how long the meal felt, although preference explained actual time spent better than tempo did.
Should every shop or restaurant play slow music?
The research does not support a single rule. A venue that earns from lingering may gain from a slower tempo, and one that relies on quick turnover may prefer a faster one.
Sources
Magsamen, S., & Ross, I. Your Brain on Art. Seed book; vault hub Books/Your Brain on Art.
Milliman, R. E. (1982). “Using background music to affect the behavior of supermarket shoppers.” Journal of Marketing, 46(3), 86-91. doi:10.2307/1251706 https://doi.org/10.2307/1251706
Milliman, R. E. (1986). “The influence of background music on the behavior of restaurant patrons.” Journal of Consumer Research, 13(2), 286-289. doi:10.1086/209068 https://doi.org/10.1086/209068
Caldwell, C., & Hibbert, S. A. (2002). “The influence of music tempo and musical preference on restaurant patrons' behavior.” Psychology & Marketing, 19(11), 895-917. doi:10.1002/mar.10043 https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.10043
Knoferle, K. M., Spangenberg, E. R., Herrmann, A., & Landwehr, J. R. (2012). “It is all in the mix: The interactive effect of music tempo and mode on in-store sales.” Marketing Letters, 23(1), 325-337. doi:10.1007/s11002-011-9156-z https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-011-9156-z