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Background music is considered an intangible element but has a close attachment to emotional reaction and memory. Background music is constantly present in our everyday lives, whether for distraction, recreation or mood enhancement. It can be heard in the supermarket, in lifts, cafés or hotels. Music has been identified as important in the construction of autobiographical memories and emotions of individuals. Many premises use music to enhance customers' emotions, and hoteliers try to use music in their lobby to increase the likelihood of customer experience. The purpose of this chapter is to examine the impact of background music as an intangible element in hotel lobbies on customer satisfaction. More specifically, this study aims to draw a connection between the musical variables (musicscape) in hotel lobbies with regard to the gender and age of guests and how hotel businesses can make use of this intangible element to enhance their guest's satisfaction. Sound marketing is an overlooked area in hospitality and tourism research. A mixed-method approach has been employed in this study, including a questionnaire and online interviews. The result shows that background music in hotel lobbies has a significant impact on customer satisfaction and the time they are willing to spend in the lobby. Moreover, different musical variables have obvious influences on the experience of guests of different ages and genders. The results of this study provide theoretical and managerial recommendations on the importance of sound marketing in a hotel lobby setting.

Literature reveals that a positive store environment is likely to be a driver to enhance buying experiences and stimulate customers purchase decision. This study further investigates the perception of restaurant environment. A field survey is conducted in the Chiayi City, Taiwan by collecting 398 usable samples. The questionnaire is based on past studies of store environment attributes, therefore, considers ambient, design, and social factors. The study finds that a high correlation exists between ambient factor and design factor. It suggests that they could be viewed as a conjunctive dimension. Furthermore, one result indicates that primary and secondary emotions create different levels of impact on planned behaviors.

Retail marketing is in the midst of an evolution. The paradigm is shifting from a product-centric to a consumer-centric focus, with a particular emphasis on understanding how consumers transition from harboring an interest in a product to actually purchasing that product. In response, shopper marketing, and in-store marketing (ISM) in particular, have emerged as important mechanisms to influence shopper behavior in brick & mortar and online retail environments. The academic literature is replete with work on what factors of ISM influence shopper behavior. In this chapter, we categorize prominent streams of findings on ISM into firm, customer, competitor and product characteristics of ISM and examine how the notion of a “store” is evolving from bricks to clicks – namely from physical formats to online shopping experiences. Insights from this chapter will help retailers and store managers identify what their customers respond to within a physical store, how technology is changing the way they can capture information on customers, and how shopper behavior is evolving in response to brick & mortar and online retail environments.

Deriving pleasure and meaning from one’s job is especially potent in the cultural industries, where workers routinely sacrifice monetary rewards, stability, and tidier careers for the nonmonetary benefits of self-expression, autonomy, and contribution to the greater good. Cultural labor markets are consequently characterized by the continual churning of its workforce; the lure of “cool” employment attracts an oversupply of aspirants while precariousness and routinized work lead to short careers. This article draws on qualitative data to further conceptualize the appeal and limits of nonmonetary rewards over time. Why do workers stay in precarious “cool” jobs? More specifically, how do workers stay committed to their jobs and perform the requisite deep acting for their roles? Through qualitative research on two sets of workers – music industry personnel and craft cocktail bartenders – this article examines patterns in these workers’ “experiential careers.” We identify three strategies cultural workers use to re-enchant their work lives: (1) deep engagement, (2) boundary work, and (3) changing jobs. In doing so, we show how the experiential careers of cultural workers resemble more of a cycle of enchantment than a linear path to exiting the field.