Background music for your garden centre, without Buma and Sena
Looking for music for your garden centre? RadioMatic gives you a station that moves with the season, indoors under the glass and outdoors on the yard, with your own messages between the tracks. Because the music is made entirely by AI, you pay nothing to Buma/Stemra, and nothing to Sena either.
You easily pay
€ 1,555
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
A garden centre is four different businesses every year. In March and April it is packed and the tills keep running. In July it is quiet and warm, in September the autumn planting arrives and from October you build the Christmas display. The music should move with that. With RadioMatic you switch on a different mood for each period. The style within it stays the same, the tracks are different every day. Your staff are on the floor six days a week all spring, and they notice that difference more than the customer who comes once a month.
Between the tracks the DJ moments name your centre. You put in yourself what is going on, about this weekend’s plant market, Saturday morning’s workshop, the perennial promotion, the delivery service or the opening hours of the Christmas display. You type it in and it is there on the next round. If a colleague is needed at the till, you simply use your own microphone, because it cuts over the music.
On the hour a short bulletin can follow with local news and the weather. In a garden centre the weather decides your whole trading day, so it belongs there. Third-party advertising never comes in between. With more sites you run them from a single dashboard, with a mood of its own and messages of its own per location.
What does music in your garden centre cost in Buma and Sena payments?
If you play music by human creators in your garden centre, you get two bills, and they are based on two different things. Buma/Stemra charges by the floor area of your centre. A garden centre falls in the ordinary shop category there, and not in the dearer one for self-service businesses, supermarkets and department stores. For large centres that tariff keeps stepping up above the highest bracket.
Sena charges by the number of staff who can hear the music, and that is where the risk sits for a garden centre. Take on seasonal staff in spring and cross a line in the table, and your Sena bill doubles while not a square metre is added. At Buma you watch something else. Glasshouse, indoor space, outdoor yard and warehouse count as one floor area as long as the same music from the same source plays there, and are charged separately when it does not. If you have a restaurant or a coffee corner, Buma/Stemra has a separate hospitality tariff for it. If you are unsure how your layout is seen, ask in writing and keep the answer.
With RadioMatic you pay nothing 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 | € 854 |
|---|---|
| Sena, including the RAAP-PPI surcharge | € 701 |
| Together per year | € 1,555 |
Sources: Buma/Stemra, mechanical background music, 2026 prices, Buma/Stemra, binding tariff text BUM.129.26/01, Buma/Stemra, hospitality, binding tariff text BUM.122.26/01, Sena, 2026 tariff overview. Buma/Stemra charges a garden centre in category B, because article 7 of BUM.129.26/01 lists shops in that category, with the exception of self-service businesses, supermarkets and department stores. Above 1,600 m² a surcharge is added for every 1,600 m² or part thereof. Sena charges in the table Verkoopruimtes I (retail spaces I), general retail, which is based on the number of FTEs who can hear the music and which steps up at 5, 10, 25 and 50 FTEs. Article 8 of BUM.129.26/01 adds floor areas within one building or establishment together when the same music from the same sound source plays there, and charges for each space separately when different music plays. Hospitality tariff BUM.122.26/01 applies, according to that tariff text, to other publicly accessible spaces as well where food and drink are supplied and can be consumed on the spot. Amounts per year, 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 for indoors, outdoors and the Christmas display
A garden centre has two acoustic worlds. Under the glasshouse the sound bounces off glass and steel and carries far. Outside on the yard it disappears instead, because nothing reflects it and it blows away. What sounds pleasant indoors often sounds too thin outside. Turning it up indoors does not help, because then the glasshouse shouts. It works better to treat the outdoor department as a zone of its own, with a slightly fuller sound and its own volume.
The visitor comes here to walk around. Someone strolling through the plant department for two hours on a Saturday morning is not waiting for a beat that drives him to the till. Calm tempo, plenty of room, few sharp high notes. In the busy weeks of March and April it gets noisy with people talking and trolleys on the concrete floor. Then the music may sit a bit firmer, so that it binds that noise together.
From October everything changes. The Christmas display has music of its own, and at many centres it runs for eight to ten weeks on end. In that period a fixed playlist drives your staff mad, because the same thirty Christmas tracks for ten weeks is very different from one shopping week in December. RadioMatic makes that music afresh every day in the same style. It stays Christmas, but never the same two days running.
It works on the system already in place, indoors and outdoors
A garden centre almost always has a 100-volt system, and that is what such a system was devised for. One amplifier, many speakers, long cable runs and a transformer per speaker. Often there are ceiling or wall speakers indoors and weatherproof ones outside. RadioMatic goes into that system through the line-in on your existing amplifier. You do not have to move a speaker or pull a cable. If you work with Sonos, Chromecast or a PC at the till, the stream plays on that too.
The zones you have now stay as they are. Glasshouse department, outdoor yard, till zone and warehouse each keep their own source and their own volume, and you run them from the same dashboard. Your announcement microphone keeps doing what it did, because it cuts over the music. With several sites every location has a mood of its own 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 garden centre and you end up with installers and with the big music subscriptions. Koster AVL has a separate page on sound in a garden centre, and writes about zones for the glasshouse, the outdoor department and the centre as a whole. Tunify is the best known name in music subscriptions in the Netherlands. Tunify charges per zone, so if you have a zone indoors and one outdoors, you pay for two.
With both of them you play music by human creators. Tunify says itself that for commercial or public use you need your own public performance licence from your local copyright organisation, whether the music comes from CDs, radio or a subscription. The Buma/Stemra and Sena bill therefore comes on top of your subscription. What it costs is set out above.
With RadioMatic the glasshouse sounds different from the outdoor yard, each with a mood of its own, and your staff hear new Christmas music every day through ten weeks of Christmas display. Between the tracks the DJ names your centre and tells customers about this weekend’s plant market. On the hour the weather follows, and in a garden centre that decides your whole day.
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 clothing shop, without Buma and SenaBackground music for clothing shops
- Background music for your bookshop, without Buma and SenaBackground music for bookshops
- Background music for your pet shop, without Buma and SenaBackground music for specialist pet shops
- Background music for your optician’s shop, without Buma and SenaBackground music for opticians
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.