Background music in the shopping centre, without Buma and Sena
If you manage a shopping centre, you pay Buma/Stemra and Sena for music in the common areas. How much, you work out below. With RadioMatic you pay nothing to Buma/Stemra and Sena, because the music is made entirely with AI.
With RadioMatic from € 29.99 per location per month, without Buma and Sena. News and your own announcements with Professional. See all plans
What do you pay now for music in your shopping centre?
Three questions, and you see what you now spend on Buma/Stemra, Sena and your music service.
How big is your business?
What else you get
The only sound everyone shares As a manager you choose music for a space that ten or fifty tenants border on. What plays in the arcade is the only sound the whole centre shares. With RadioMatic that is your own station and not a relayed broadcaster, so there is no third-party advertising in it. In a shopping centre that counts for a lot. Otherwise a visitor in the arcade hears an offer from a party that is not one of your tenants.
Messages for the whole centre Between the tracks you place messages that matter to the centre. Think of the opening hours over the holidays, the retailers association event, the new tenant opening on Saturday, work at the north entrance or where the charging points are. You type it in and it is there on the next round. For an announcement that cannot wait, your announcement microphone keeps working.
Every centre its own mood With more centres in your portfolio you run them from a single dashboard. Each centre keeps its own mood, its own messages and its own opening hours. You can differ per zone, so the parking decks hear something other than the main arcade. And because the music is made new every day, your tenants’ staff do not keep hearing the same tracks.
What does a shopping centre manager pay Buma and Sena?
Only the common areas If you manage a shopping centre, you pay only for the common areas. Those are the arcades, the galleries, the entrances and the square. The shops each hold their own licence for the music behind their own doors. So you do not pay for your tenants, and they do not pay for the arcade.
Buma's highest category For those common areas Buma/Stemra and Sena both charge by the square metre, and both in their dearest table. Buma/Stemra puts shopping centres, streets, galleries and arcades in the highest category. If the music can only be heard along the frontages, Buma converts the total frontage length to floor area by multiplying it by three.
Sena comes out higher still Sena has its own table for shopping streets, shopping centres, galleries, arcades, outdoor areas and petrol stations, and comes out higher still there than Buma. For an arcade of any size you pay close to twice what a DIY store is charged, both bills together.
No fees for AI-made music With RadioMatic you pay nothing to Buma/Stemra or Sena, because the music is made entirely with AI. Buma/Stemra itself says that music made entirely by AI, without a creative contribution from a person, does not qualify for copyright or payment.
What the law and the court say The same applies to Sena. Sena can only collect for a recording that has been commercially released, and on that ground Sena lost in court in 2025. The full reasoning is in our legal memorandum.
| Buma/Stemra | € 1,992 |
|---|---|
| Sena, including the RAAP-PPI surcharge | € 2,766 |
| Together per year | € 4,758 |
Sources: Buma/Stemra, mechanical background music, 2026 prices, Buma/Stemra, binding tariff text BUM.129.26/01, article 7 and the examples on determining floor area, Sena, 2026 tariff overview, shopping streets and shopping centres on p. 9, mijnlicentie.nl. Article 7 of BUM.129.26/01 names shopping centres, streets, galleries and malls in so many words in the list for category A, and above the highest bracket a surcharge is added for every 1,600 m² or part thereof. That same tariff text provides that the total length of the frontages is multiplied by a factor of three to determine the floor area when the music is audible along those frontages only. Sena charges in the table for shopping streets, shopping centres, galleries, malls, outdoor areas and petrol stations on page 9 of the tariff overview, with a minimum licence period of one month. The comparison is 3,000 m² of common area against a DIY store of 1,200 m². 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. Also used ECLI:NL:RBGEL:2025:6175.
Music for people who keep walking
A floor under the footsteps In an arcade nobody stands still to listen. Visitors walk through, from the car park to the chemist and from the chemist to the exit. The music lays a floor under a space that otherwise consists only of footsteps and chatter.
Echo under a glass roof The acoustics make that hard. A covered arcade with a glass roof, tiles and hard walls rings on for a long time, and every sharp attack hangs there for seconds. Calm music with little percussion and few jumps in volume stays recognisable there. Busy music turns to noise.
For young and old at once Your audience is also the broadest there is. A shopping centre serves the fourteen-year-old pupil and the visitor of eighty at the same moment. Music that appeals to one age group drives the other away. What is left is music that young and old both find perfectly fine. You build a station like that with a style and a few settings, and not with a playlist someone put together to their own taste.
Saturday, Monday and December Per zone and per moment it may differ. On a Saturday afternoon in a busy arcade the energy may sit higher than on a Monday morning. In December the whole mood changes, and that Christmas mood then runs for eight weeks on end. With RadioMatic new Christmas music is added every day in those weeks, in the same style. So your tenants’ staff do not keep hearing the same Christmas tracks for eight weeks.
It works on the building’s announcement system
Through the existing amplifier A shopping centre always has a 100-volt system, and usually that is also the building’s announcement system. One amplifier room, dozens of speakers in the arcades and on the decks, long cable runs and a transformer per speaker. RadioMatic goes in through the line-in on your existing amplifier. No speaker has to be moved and no extra cable is needed. Where you work with a Sonos, a Chromecast or a browser, the stream plays there just as well.
Zones and priority stay The zone layout in place stays. North arcade, south arcade, entrance hall, square and parking deck each keep their own source and their own volume, all from the same dashboard. Your announcement microphone and your evacuation system keep priority over the music, as now, because to that system RadioMatic is only the source.
Live within ten minutes With more centres under management they sit under one account with its own mood per centre. You hear back within one working day, and after that your station is live in under ten minutes.
What you can choose from today
Agencies that build a station Look for music for a shopping centre and you end up with agencies that build a bespoke radio station. Retail Radio, part of Cue Creative, builds such stations for large chains and shopping centres. You pay a one-off amount for the set-up there, and then a fixed amount per month. FunkHaus supplied shopping centres across the Netherlands with background music and announcements through Radioworks.
You take out the licence With both of them you play music by human creators. Retail Radio says itself that it gives extensive advice on the music rights at Buma/Stemra and Sena. So as the manager you take out that licence yourself, and that bill comes on top of what you pay for the station. What it costs is set out above.
With RadioMatic your arcades play music that drives away neither the fourteen-year-old pupil nor the visitor of eighty, and the parking decks hear something other than the main arcade. Between the tracks you announce the new tenant opening on Saturday or the work at the north entrance. With more centres, you run them all from one dashboard.
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 Professional, no studio |
| Local news and weather | No | Yes, the station’s | No | Yes, with Professional, your town |
| Other people’s adverts | No | Yes | No | No |
| Several locations | Set up per location | No | Set up per location | Yes, from one place, each with its own mood |
| Buma/Stemra and Sena | Payable | Payable | See the terms | Not payable |
Frequently asked questions about music in your shopping centre
Other kinds of business
- Background music in the car park, without Buma and SenaCar parks
- Background music for your DIY store, without Buma and SenaDIY store and home improvement shop
- Background music for your clothing shop, without Buma and SenaBackground music for clothing shops
- Background music for your fast food outlet, without Buma and SenaFast food and chain outlets
Background music for business. What is allowed, what does it cost and what are your options?
Ready to hear it for yourself?
Try RadioMatic free for 14 days. Your own station for your business, without Buma/Stemra and Sena, and cancel monthly if you pay monthly.
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