Social Headphones

Imagine the local Bagles and Beans offering the following case:

How can we make drinking coffee into a better experience?

To answer this question I need to know a couple of things. First, I need to know why people come to B&B for coffee. After all they can make coffee at home as well.
Most people visiting the cafe do so becouse they want a converation. They talk to the employees, they talk to the people at their table and most likely, they bing someone along. Others, on the contrary, want a moment for themselves. A moment to drink coffee in peace and read a newspaper. These different intentions don’t always work well together. The tranquillity-seekers sometimes get annoyed by the conversationals and some of the conversationals are to shy to start an actual converation due to a lack of subject to talk aboud and very busy personnell.

Another question to ask is, what sort of experience is drinking coffee on itself?
Most people describe coffee as a moment of peace before diving headfirst in the the cacaphony of everyday life. The want to wake up from their early sleepyness and feel energised again. Coffee is tranquillity before activation, its rejuvination. I can be shared, but it can be a private moment of enjoyment as well. It’s sensual and cleansing, you can take it for a hobby that doen’t require much time.

So, drinking coffee at the local B&B is:
A moment of rejuvination which is preferrible shared with others.

How can this be enhanced?
By offering a way for people to connect with eachother. People get more energised from social activities than private ones. Even the newspaper-reader wants to share the news otherwise he would have stayed at home/work. Most people however find it hard to start a conversation out of the blue. Therefore a commom subject of conversation should be introduced.

Did the company try something like this before?
Actually they did. During the past winter, the local Bagles and Beans introduced light treatment to cheer people up during the dark and depressing winter days. If the system worked or not can be left out of the question, people sitting around with these rediculous devices automaticly cheered up the mood of the customers and attracted more customers into the cafe. However for the shy people and the people who preferred to be left alone this concept didn’t work out.

Concept: The Bagles and Beans music experience
On all tables in the cafe headphones in different colors can be found and the local music is turned off. The headphones are color-coded to indicat the genre of music they are playing. Each genre plays the same song at the same moment. This turns the cafe into a sort of silent disco, people can listen to their preferred music without bothering others. This introduces a commom subject to talk about. The whole thing is an experience on itself but people sharing a color of headphones automatticly know to what music the other person is listning. This gives them something to talk about over their cup of coffee. And people who want to be left alone can simply leave the headphones off.

This concept works because it has a very low treshold. People visiting the cafe will give the concept a try when it is right in front of them.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.