Starbucks and Music

I've never really been a big Starbucks person because I absolutely can't stand their coffee straight up (I am a black coffee drinker) and don't drink the fou-fou drinks (read: lattes). That changed about a two months ago when I was killing time downtown after a lunch and discovered the magical elixir known as the Pumpkin Spice Latte. Since then I've been hooked.

As my trips became more frequent and started to spend a little bit more time in the stores anxiously waiting for the barista to make my drinks, I've noticed that Starbucks has a lot of music for sale amongst the traditional coffee shop fare of mugs and beans. It seemed kind of odd to me since I wouldn't exactly associate the coffee mega-chain to be pushing music and it made me wonder a couple things. Who the hell buys music at Starbucks and do they sell any of these CDs which are priced significantly higher than traditional outlets? According to an article in the WSJ, apparently a lot of their customers do and the units sold at Starbucks account for anywhere between 20 and 30% of an album's weekly sales. I'll be damned.

Filed in: culture consume brands economics starbucks music