Background music for your car wash, without Buma and Sena
RadioMatic gives your car wash a station of its own for the waiting area and the site, one that can take the noise of the blowers and promotes your own subscriptions between the tracks.
You easily pay
€ 2,150
a year to Buma/Stemra and Sena
If you play music in your business, this bill is compulsory. The amount is the base rate for the worked example below, and your music subscription comes on top of it.
Work out what you pay nowWith RadioMatic you pay
€ 29.99
per location per month, billed yearly
= € 360 a year, everything included
The Starter plan, excluding VAT. No payment is due to Buma/Stemra or Sena, so this is the whole amount. There is a free plan as well.
Fourteen days free to try. Monthly billing is available and costs 20% more, and only then can you cancel monthly. Once your application is approved, usually within five working days, your station is live in ten minutes.
What else you get
At a car wash your customer has to wait, and most businesses never get that. First he sits in the queue for the entrance, then in the waiting area or at the vacuums. That is five to ten minutes in which he has nothing to do but look and listen. You can do something with that. The DJ moments name your car wash and play what you type in yourself. You can tell him what a monthly unlimited wash subscription costs, that the wheel rim programme can be added or that the vacuums are free. You type it in and you hear it on the next round.
You need no studio, no voice actor and no separate advertising pillar for that. Third-party advertising never comes in between at RadioMatic. If your site also has a pump or a shop, that is a difference from ordinary radio. That can play your customers in the queue a spot for the car wash down the road.
Your staff hear it all day. Someone stands at the entrance waving cars in or at the exit drying off, in surroundings that are noisy already. A fixed list of three hundred tracks soon gets irritating there. With RadioMatic the music is generated rather than pulled from a list. So the style stays put, and the tracks are new every day. With more locations you run them from a single dashboard with a mood of its own and its own offers per site.
At a car wash the Sena bill is the biggest
A car wash is open to the public. That is why it falls outside the tariff for work spaces, which applies only to spaces the public does not enter. At Buma/Stemra a car wash belongs in the lower of the two background music categories. That one charges per square metre rather than per employee. Sena classifies a car wash with the shopping streets and shopping centres. That also goes by floor area, but with a tariff of its own that is a good deal heavier. So for the same site you get two bills of very different size.
That ratio is the point here. The Sena bill is well over double the Buma/Stemra one, while many business owners budget on the Buma amount alone. A workshop with a handful of mechanics in a hall without public pays a fraction of that between both bills. That is not down to the number of listeners. As soon as the public is allowed in, the charge is worked out in square metres instead of people. So declare only the floor area where the music can actually be heard. Unsure how the waiting area, the tunnel and the vacuum bay are counted? Then ask in writing and keep the answer.
With RadioMatic no payment is due to Buma/Stemra or Sena, because the music is generated entirely by AI and there are therefore no rights holders. Buma/Stemra itself states that works made entirely by AI without a human creative contribution do not qualify for copyright or payment. The same applies to Sena. The law requires a phonogram released for commercial purposes, and on that ground Sena lost in court in 2025. The full reasoning is in our legal memorandum.
| Buma/Stemra | € 569 |
|---|---|
| Sena, including the RAAP-PPI surcharge | € 1,581 |
| Together per year | € 2,150 |
Sources: Buma/Stemra, binding tariff text for mechanical background music BUM.129.26/01, article 7 and article 8, the binding tariff text for work spaces BUM.132.26/01, which limits the work spaces tariff BUM.411.26/01 to spaces not accessible to the public, the mechanical background music tariff sheet BUM.413.26/01 and Sena, 2026 tariff overview, page 9, table Winkelstraten / winkelcentra / galerijen / passages / buitenruimtes / tankstations. The category B scale runs by floor area up to 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1,600 m², and the Sena scale follows the same lines. By way of comparison, the work spaces tariff charges by FTE, up to 10, 25, 50, 100 and 200. Amounts per year and base tariff, Buma/Stemra excluding VAT, Sena exempt from VAT and here including the RAAP-PPI surcharge of 26.6%. Details of other providers from their own sites, consulted on 23 September 2026.
Work out what you save on your current licence.
Slide in your situation and you will see what you currently pay in music rights every year. That amount disappears, on top of what you save on your current music subscription.
Music that carries over the blowers
Around a car wash it is noisy. Blowers at the end of the tunnel, the pressure washer, vacuums on the forecourt and cars idling while they wait. Music that has to come through that needs emphasis in the mid range and a clear pulse. Deep bass disappears into the open air outside, and the high notes are blown away by the blowers. Soft, thin music you simply do not hear there, even with the amplifier switched on.
The waiting area is the opposite. Your customer sits there indoors, behind glass, looking out at his own car. It is the only spot on the site where it can be calm and where someone sits still for a few minutes. Calmer music at a lower volume works better there. It is also the moment when an announcement about your subscription or your wheel rim programme really lands. With RadioMatic you make those two separate zones, each with a mood of its own and a volume of its own, from the same dashboard.
Outside there is something else at play. Speakers on a site carry further than you think, certainly in the evening and certainly with houses nearby. So outside, work with more speakers at a lower volume rather than two horns you have to open up a long way. Per part of the day you can have the volume and the style move along, so that it gets calmer by itself after about seven.
On the installation already there
Most car washes already have a sound installation, usually an amplifier in the plant room with weatherproof speakers above the tunnel and at the vacuums, often on a 100-volt system. The RadioMatic stream goes into that system through the line-in on the amplifier and the zones you have now stay as they are. If you have a Sonos or a Chromecast in the waiting area, it plays on that. A browser on a PC or tablet at the till is enough to start.
If you want to run the waiting area separately from the site, you put a source of its own there and operate both from the same dashboard. No engineer comes round and no cables are pulled. With more locations, every site has a mood of its own and its own announcements under one account. After your application is approved, usually within five working days, a station is live in ten minutes. The first fourteen days are free to try.
What you can choose from today
Look for music for your car wash and you will not find a provider with a page of its own for car washes. You end up with general in-store services. IMPAQT Media supplies tailored music programming and in-store commercials to retail, hospitality and supermarkets. Tunify names car parks and petrol stations in its own sector list.
With both of them you are playing music by human creators. That means two extra bills, from Buma/Stemra and from Sena. Tunify says itself that for commercial or public use you need a public performance licence of your own. What that costs is set out above.
With RadioMatic the site gets music with a clear pulse that carries over the blowers and the vacuums, and the waiting area gets something calmer at a lower volume. While your customer waits for his car, he hears what your monthly subscription costs or that the wheel rim programme can be added. In the evening it gets quieter outside by itself, so the neighbours are not bothered.
Why RadioMatic is something other than a playlist or the radio
A business owner who wants music on the premises usually picks from three things. A playlist from a streaming service, an ordinary radio station, or a royalty-free music package. This is where they differ.
| Playlist | Ordinary radio | Royalty-free | RadioMatic | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New music | Fixed list | Yes, but not your choice | Limited catalogue | New every day |
| Music that is yours alone | No | No | No | Yes, your own hits |
| Fits the time of day | Switch it yourself | No | Switch it yourself | Automatic |
| Names your business | No | No | No | Yes |
| Your own offers | No | Only if you buy advertising | No | Yes, with no studio |
| Local news and weather | No | Yes, the station’s | No | Yes, your town, your choice of topics |
| Other people’s adverts | No | Yes | No | No |
| Buma/Stemra and Sena | Payable | Payable | See the terms | Not payable |
New music every day
The station keeps getting new tracks in the same style, because the music is generated rather than drawn from a fixed list. A track that lands well with your audience comes round more often, and then it is your hit. It was made for your station and plays nowhere else.
It names your business
Between the tracks, DJ voices announce what is going on at your place. Your offer, your opening hours, this week’s deal. That used to need a studio and a voice actor.
It moves with the day
The morning, the rush and the last hour each call for something different. That is set per part of the day and happens by itself, with nobody behind the counter picking a new list.
Local news if you want it
A short bulletin on the hour about your own town, with the weather and the traffic alongside. You choose which subjects you want, or you switch it off entirely.
No one else’s advertising
On an ordinary station the business down the road advertises in between your tracks. With us, nothing comes in between that is not yours.
Every location from one screen
Each site keeps its own mood, its own promotions and its own opening hours, and you run them all from the same place.
A playlist is worn out within two weeks, and on an ordinary station the business down the road advertises in between your tracks. With us the station is yours. Your style, your announcements, and the tracks that land with your audience come round more often.
Questions that come with this
Other kinds of business
- Background music for your petrol station, without Buma and SenaPetrol station and shop
- Background music for your hair salon, without Buma and SenaBackground music for hair salons
- Background music for your beauty salon, without Buma and SenaBackground music for beauty salons
- Background music for your nail studio, without Buma and SenaBackground music for nail studios
Ready to hear it for yourself?
Request access to the beta. Your own station for your business, 14 days free trial, and monthly cancellation if you pay monthly.