Making sure you have the right licenses to perform music in your store can be a tricky, confusing and expensive exercise. Frankly, that’s why most businesses contract with a music service like Custom Channels – because we handle all of the licenses for you as part of your monthly fee – so you can worry about running your business instead of running afoul of copyright laws.

Here’s the bottom line: most businesses need to obtain “public performance licenses” from Performing Rights Organizations (PROS), namely ASCAP, BMI and SESAC in order to play or “publicly perform” music in their place of business. Every year, dozens of bars, restaurants, stores, nightclubs, hotels and others are sued (usually successfully) by the PROS. Some have even been put out of business through successful lawsuits over copyright infringement.

So, if you want to play your iPod or a local radio station or your CD collection in your store, you’ll probably still need to sign up and get licenses directly from the PROS. This is often a costly and time-consuming endeavor.

Oh, one more thing. Let’s say you want to go ahead and get your own licenses from the PROS and do your own music. But if you think it’s as easy as making copies of your favorite music library on a dozen iPods or mix CDs and distributing them out to the stores, think again. To make copies, you must also get permission from the record labels and publishers directly. The penalties for unlawfully copying songs for commercial use can be stiff.

Custom Channels In-store Radio already covers all the licensing costs so you have nothing to worry about. We also allow you to place your own individualized messaging in your handpicked music selection so you don’t hear unwanted commercials, song repetition or low-quality sound. And, we’re music fanatics, so we can take the artists you already know and love and help expand your music selection.