Apple, Starbucks launch Pick of the Week

Apple and Starbucks on Tuesday announced a new collaboration, dubbed Pick of the Week. The program offers Starbucks customers free music and music videos, downloadable from the iTunes Store. According to the companies, the content will be available through Pick of the Week download cards, provided at more than 7,000 Starbucks locations in the United States. The cards will be good for 60 days from the date a song is named "Pick of the Week," and allow customers to get a complimentary (though pre-selected) song or music video.

The promotion is first highlighting “Washington Square” by the Counting Crows. Future artists for Pick of the Week will include Carly Simon, Duffy, Adele, Sia, and Hilary McRae, according to Starbucks.

“Pick of the Week provides an incredible way for Starbucks customers to discover great new music and videos for free on the iTunes Store,” reads a statement from Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of iTunes. “With the world’s largest online catalog of music and video there is truly something for everyone.”

The new promo is billed as the next phase in a partnership between Starbucks and Apple, which began with the launch of the Starbucks Entertainment Area within iTunes in October 2006, and the launch of the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store at select Starbucks locations last October. The Wi-Fi Music Store allows customers to download music directly onto an iPhone, iPod touch or computer with no Wi-Fi login info or connection fees. It is currently available in select Starbucks locations in the New York, Seattle and San Francisco metropolitan areas, and is eventually expected to be rolled out nationally across the US. Starbucks also offers a "Now Playing" feature on the Wi-Fi Music Store, which allows customers to instantly preview, buy and download the music currently playing overhead in participating locations.

50-million song promo only results in 6 million songs downloaded

As part of its partnership, Starbucks last fall announced that it would giveaway more than 50 million free songs to help promote the new "Now Playing" iTunes service. The "Song of the Day" promo, which ran for more than 30 days, offered 1.5 million songs each day across its 10,000 Starbucks locations; however, the promo only resulted in about 6 million songs downloaded, according to data released by Starbucks.

Apple's iTunes overtook Wal-Mart in February to become the top music retailer in the US market, with over 50 million customers and four billion songs sold from its catalog of over 6 million tracks.

Filed under: industry
Other story tags: iTunes, Starbucks, digital music, promo, free music