Decibel overload

You go to a restaurant to eat. And, if you're with someone, to chat or share a good meal, lingering over conversation afterward. Dining out is, among many other things, a social activity. However, it's becoming increasingly common to walk into a restaurant and find the music so loud that you have to call one of the other diners over to ask for bread.

I'm not talking about nightclubs or bars. I'm talking about restaurants. Conversations get lost because nobody can hear anything. What is the function of music in a restaurant from an economic point of view? It has two.

First: music creates atmosphere. It places the customer in a specific era, style, or identity, just like lighting or decor. It's part of the experience. Second: studies show that loud music increases turnover—people eat faster—and reduces dwell time. This works well for establishments that want high customer traffic.

However, neuromarketing provides considerable evidence that loud noise increases stress and reduces the perception of control. It hinders conversation, and conversation is one of the main drivers of satisfaction in social experiences like eating out. Raising one's voice is cognitively interpreted as a lack of privacy and discomfort.

Herein lies the economic paradox. The restaurant owner seeks to enhance the experience with music. But when they do it poorly, they introduce friction that erodes the much-discussed customer experience. And, upon leaving, you feel: "The place is nice, but the music is unbearable."

The restaurateur thinks, "If there's no music, something's missing." And that something is precisely what's missing. In service design, those who design experiences often don't test them. The owner feels the music in an empty space. But the customer will in a full one. The same is true in hotels. I always say that interior designers don't sleep in the rooms they design.

There are simple solutions. Play music when the venue is empty and automatically reduce the volume as the ambient noise increases. Or, simply, silence. That's also an aesthetically pleasing option.

There are probably customers who enjoy loud music. That's for sure. But the mistake is thinking that this preference compensates for the majority of customers. In the restaurant industry, as in so many other services, what bothers people outweighs what they like. It's essential to understand what a restaurant is for, beyond just eating. When a customer leaves feeling overwhelmed, the experience hasn't been good, no matter how good the food was.