Music Increases Retail Sales on Weekdays Only

Customers need a boost during weekdays because they're mentally depleted.

Man buying more food on a weekday because music is playing in the store

Overview

Life is exhausting. Especially during the week.

After a grueling day, people make decisions in a quick and mindless way — it's called System 1 processing.

In this mindset, music is persuasive. People feel good because of the music, and they assume these positive emotions are coming from the products: Hmm, do I want to buy these jeans? I feel good about it, so yes.

Researchers tested this idea with a retail chain in Europe. And they were right. Across four months, stores increased their sales up to 11% when they played different music (e.g., elevator music, popular songs). But it only happened on weekdays. This effect disappeared (and sometimes decreased) on weekends (Ahlbom, Roggeveen, Grewal, & Nordfält, 2022).

Ahlbom, C. P., Roggeveen, A. L., Grewal, D., & Nordfält, J. (2022). Understanding How Music Influences Shopping on Weekdays and Weekends. Journal of Marketing Research.