Music can help you establish the right atmosphere in your business.
However, a bad sound system can make it harder for your customers and employees to listen to the songs, which can have the opposite effect you want.
Your customers might get bored or distracted, as they try to shop and listen to grainy or echoing songs at the same time. Worse, they might begin to feel irritated and not know why, which can impact how they perceive your store.
Fortunately, there are fantastic options for good quality sound systems for all types of businesses, large and small. With some guidance, you can find the best retail sound systems for your business in 2024, helping you to create the best setting to welcome people to your location.
Quick Answer: What Are Great Speakers for Business?
Let’s get right to the point: What are the best speakers for business? We examined all the products out there, looking for speakers that offer exceptional sound quality, high compatibility, and easy installation from companies with a good reputation and a moderate price point.
Next, we looked into the specific needs of business environments, including the following:
- Restaurants: Consumers want clear, pleasant music that won’t overpower their conversations. Since some people like to sit outside, the speakers should also be at least a little weatherproof.
- Retail: Consumers want to feel welcomed by the music without feeling overwhelmed by sound.
- Hotels: Most hotels have different music needs (including songs appropriate for gyms, hallways, and dining areas). We looked for speakers that were discreet and easy to program.
- Offices: Workers want clear audio for meetings and conferences, and they need even sound distribution for background music.
This chart shows what we came up with:
Sound System: Terms to Know
Before we get into the details of how to bring the best audio quality to your customers, we need to clarify some of the technical terms that we’ll be using a lot in this guide.
- Power Amplifier: An amplifier is an electronic device that increases the amplitude (simply put, the loudness of sound) of electric signals. This device takes an electric current, magnifies it many times over, and then sends it to a loudspeaker, so an audience can hear an enhanced version of the original sound.Why does it matter? A power amplifier can take a signal from something small (like a phone) and make it large enough to fill a room without distorting it.
- Mixer: Also called a mixing console or an audio mixer, this electronic device combines, balances, and mixes audio signals. Mixers are typically used during sound recording, but some professional sound systems in businesses use them to enhance the quality of foreground music.Why does it matter? A mixer is critical for high-quality sound. If your business will be filled with consumers who want to hear lovely music (such as those in a high-end restaurant), a mixer makes this possible.
- Music player: This is any device that plays music, from a phone to a high-quality turntable. These devices can link directly to speakers or use other electronics like mixers and amplifiers to produce better quality sound.Why does it matter? Choosing the right music player is critical, as some won’t work with every type of speaker you want to use. Others won’t allow you to access the music source you want.
- Speaker: The full word is loudspeaker. This item converts the electric current provided by the amplifier into audio sound waves and projects these out at different angles so the listener can enjoy the music.Why does it matter? A powered speaker has a built-in amplifier and often comes with special features (like Bluetooth). A passive speaker relies on an external amplifier. Knowing details like this can help you buy the right product for your space.
Common Sound Systems for Business
Businesses of all sizes use sound systems for background or foreground music. Of course, concert halls and recording studios need large professional sound systems, but what about cafes, bars, restaurants, retail outlets, bookstores, movie theaters, and other businesses?
From a small system with just a laptop and a couple of Bluetooth speakers to a complete system reaching hundreds of customers across multiple floors, here are some suggestions for sound system setups:
Live Music
If you plan to have live music in your business, the performers might bring their own equipment, but you might also need to provide some of your own, such as the following:
- Microphones and mic stands
- Mixing boards
- Mixing desk
- Monitors
- Amps
- Cables for sound equipment
- Live mixing digital audio workstations (DAWs)
- PA sound systems
- Light boards
Restaurant, Bar, and Café Systems
Consumer spaces like malls, restaurants, and retail outlets all have lots of people making noise. Human bodies absorb sound. Furniture, items for sale, and architecture like poles or doorways can all block, absorb, or change sound.
If you have any kind of consumer business, consider the number of speakers you will need and where to place them. You are less likely to need light boards, PA systems, or microphones, and you can stick to the basic sound system.
Sound Distribution in a Business
People carry their music with them wherever they go, so if you want to play music in your store, you have to compete with high-quality headphones and re-engineered digital recordings. Getting the right sound system for your space is crucial.
Four speakers are usually the minimum recommended for the smoothest distribution of sound, depending on their placement. This helps you control the overall volume of each individual speaker without sacrificing clarity. Customers are not overwhelmed by the volume, but the music is still present.
You may need more speakers if you have lots of walls, pillars, or other architectural barriers in your store. If you have a small open space, you may only need two, or you could get smaller speakers and strictly manage the volume.
One way to do this is to purchase two or three hi-fi amplifiers and connect them in a process known as daisy chaining. Daisy chaining allows you to give each speaker its own volume, so no matter where a customer sits, they aren’t overwhelmed or underwhelmed by your music. This occurs through a stereo amplifier that has a “rec out” ability, which allows you to hook the amplifier out to the input of a second amplifier.
Crutchfield suggests investing in a 70-volt system to avoid load impedance and to ensure that the quality is well distributed in a larger business. High-quality individual speakers can also be advantageous because they allow the same products and systems to also be useful for smaller locations.
A small diner, for example, will not need an array of perfectly positioned speakers because no customer will enjoy being blasted by music from all sides. Depending on the size and the maximum capacity of customers, two speakers might be just what you need.
How Many Speakers for Business Do You Need?
Every one of your speaker choices works a little differently. Wall-mounted speakers, for example, can typically cover less space than an in-ceiling speaker. Sound moves differently through a room depending on whether it’s coming from above, below, or to the side.
Professional speaker installation companies like AudioVolt provide calculators to help you estimate how many speakers you need, depending on the type you’ve purchased. Tools like this can help give you an idea of how many products to buy, but they’re not perfect.
For example, if your space is broken up by many dividers or temporary walls, you’ll need more speakers than someone who has a completely open space. The acoustics of the room matter too, as many reflective spaces can push sound further than it might go in a muffled room.
Why Are Audio Mixers Needed in Business?
In a business, having an audio mixer as part of your setup allows you to change both your audio zones and your volume zones. This is especially useful when you have a large space where you have multiple sounds coming through your speakers, and you need a mixer to balance and stabilize different outputs.
In cases like these, you don’t need to have the most expensive speakers (although that wouldn’t hurt). It would be a better investment to buy a superior amplifier since this gives you more control over the audio zones in your business or office space.
Only a smaller number of companies offer the necessary hardware when you get up to this level of audio fidelity. Bose and DBX have good options.
Using a Smartphone as a Music Source
Many businesses use an iPad, smartphone, or similar tablet at their point-of-sale, opting to replace the traditional cash register with a single device that can process payments, and keep inventory and customer records at literal and metaphorical fingertips. But a smartphone can also be a music source. Any recognized app can create and play playlists while still being used for point-of-sale transactions.
Smartphones allow Bluetooth connections to speakers nearby, but this connection can be fragile. Bluetooth speakers may not provide the best sound quality, depending on your space. A more stable system uses cables linking the speakers to a source like an amplifier, which you can plug directly into your smartphone using the headphone jack.
Smart Speakers for Business
A relatively new kind of speaker in the market is the smart speaker. These are wireless speakers with a built-in voice control capability. A user activates the speaker with a “wake word,” gives it a command, and the software in the speaker carries it out.
The speakers are usually single-unit wireless speakers or soundbars working via a Bluetooth connection. The software is developed as artificial intelligence by Apple, Google, Amazon, or Microsoft, with other technology brands like Samsung coming up with their own versions. Google Assistant powers the Google Home device; Amazon’s Alexa is the voice inside the Amazon Echo unit; and Apple’s iconic Siri is behind the HomePod speaker.
Smart speakers may have brought the digital age into our living rooms, but what does this have to do with business? The Lexington-Herald Leader writes that the strong push toward voice search and commands should be of interest to marketers and business owners. It is how we know what customers want, what they’re looking for, and what they like to do.
Using a smart speaker in your business means anticipating what customers are looking for in terms of services and products. Amazon Books, the brick-and-mortar retail bookstore owned by Amazon, not only offers the Amazon Echo smart speaker for sale, but it also displays them for customers to interact with, simply by saying “Alexa,” and then giving the device a command. Suggestions are often included on cards next to the devices.
This intuitive form of interaction seems fun, but it presents a vital point of connection between the customer and the business. This is how, for example, Amazon knows what people want (basic information about traffic and weather, adding items to shopping lists, or playing music), and tweaks its search engine optimization and software fixes to better deliver such results.
The interaction also gives Amazon an idea of their customer base and how Amazon’s unique resources can best help them. While most businesses don’t have those resources, they can nonetheless use smart speakers to learn more about their customers and then provide the necessary services.
These are not just a few tech-savvy customers. Almost one in five adults, or 47.3 million people, has access to a smart speaker. Missing out on a kind of communication and accessibility that almost 50 million people use at home could be lethal for a business.
Using smart speakers in a business helps more than the customers. TechRepublic writes that the Apple HomePod speaker is great for conference calls and improving employee productivity by allowing workers to perform hands-free multitasking while working with relevant, real-time information, such as stock reports, calendar updates, and even sending text messages through a shared office Apple account.
In this way, an amplifier, a set of speakers, an audio mixer, a smart speaker, and a computer to hold them all together can take your customers’ experience of your business to an unprecedented level of service and access.
How Much Will a Sound System for My Business Cost?
Prices on professional sound systems vary greatly depending on the quality, size, and features of the speakers, mixers, and amplifiers. Here's a general look at what you might expect to pay:
You’ll also have ongoing costs for music in your business. You must pay for the electricity to power the system, of course, and you must also pay a subscription to cover the use of legal music.
Companies like Pandora CloudCover negotiate directly with music copyright holders, so you can play the songs you want without breaking the law. Most companies provide their services for a low monthly fee.
While you can find sales and discounts on sound systems for business, it’s often worth it to invest in a better quality system in the long run. These high-quality systems are built to last, and you’ll likely run into fewer issues than if you purchase a budget system. The same is true for choosing a music partner. Someone with good service and a large catalog is a good investment for any business.
Improving Sound Quality: Acoustic Treatment Essentials
You’ve chosen the best speakers for business, and you’ve installed them properly. What else can you do to enhance the sound quality and ensure you get the most out of your investment? Consider the acoustics of the rooms where your speakers are installed.
Many restaurants, hotel lobbies, and retail environments use vinyl or tiled floors for quick cleanups. While these floors can be beautiful, they can also create unwanted echo and reverberation. The same goes for wide and bare windows.
Use carpets and curtains when you can to dampen an echo and keep the music crisp and clear. If you can’t cover the floors completely, consider adding things like tapestries or sound-reducing panels to the walls or ceiling.
In office spaces, use flexible partitions and screens to trap sounds in one area when needed. These tools can also be helpful in hotel lobbies, particularly when there’s a lot of traffic and conversations.
If your DIY steps don’t help, consider hiring an acoustics expert to assist you. Sometimes, these professionals can install special panels to reduce echoes and special floor coverings to dampen sound.
References
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- Loudspeaker Basics. Electronics Notes.
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- How to Power a Multi-Room Music System. (May 2018). Crutchfield.
- iPad, Tablet Point-of-Sale Systems Gain Popularity. (May 2013). Entrepreneur.
- Smart Speakers – Everything You Need to Know. (June 2018). What Hi-Fi?
- The Voice Search Explosion and How It Will Change Local Search. (June 2016). Search Engine Land.
- Now 18 Percent of Americans Own a Smart Speaker. (July 2018). Billboard.
- How Voice Assistants, Smart Speakers Can Improve Your Business. (February 2018). Lexington Herald-Leader.
- Amazon’s First Washington-Area Bookstore Opens March 13. (March 2018). The Washington Post.
- 47.3 Million U.S. Adults Have Access to a Smart Speaker, Report Says. (March 2018). Tech Crunch.
- Kids and Technologies: Smart Speakers. (June 2018). Forbes.
- Apple HomePod: 3 Business Uses for the Smart Speaker. (February 2018). Tech Republic.
- The Basic Elements of a Sound System. (October 2019). One Way Event Productions.
- How Does a Sound Mixer Work? MixButton.
- What Sound Equiptment Do You Need for Live Music? (April 2020). IPR.
- Small Retail Sound System. Pure Renaissance Audio.
- How to Calculate the Number of Speakers to Install In Your Business. AudioVolt.