Marie Wiere's Blue Sky Management Blog

Virtuo at last year's Las Vegas exhibition

Earlier this month I wrote a post on Megabus, a long distance bus service that had experienced success in the declining transportation industry by rethinking the product and business model. In this post I am going to write about a company called TouchTunes, who have achieved similar success by recreating the old school jukebox.

TouchTunes has created a touch screen broadband connected machine called the Virtuo, which revives the jukebox. The Virtuo was described by a vending machine distributor as being “like an iPad on steroids”.  The machine has more than 20 times the song choice of traditional jukeboxes. In addition it has enhanced search capabilities even enabling customers to search for a song using part of a lyric.

The Virtuo’s operating system OpenStage facilitates the integration of social network sites. The latest Virtuo machines revealed last month contain PhotoBooth (enabling people to take pictures at the jukebox, which they can share on Facebook) and a karaoke service.

There is also a Virtuo app, which can be downloaded to enable customers to make their song requests on their phone without getting up from their seat. Some customers have even been known to queue up their song to time it with their arrival. This video sums up some of Virtuo’s capabilities:

Virtuo machines sell for $5495 and their average weekly income is $320 (almost three times the jukebox industry average of $113 in 2010). Songs typically cost $0.50 and double in price for karaoke.

Over the past 15 years the number of jukebox machines in the U.S. has declined by 40%. Helping to turn around the jukebox industry’s decline, TouchTunes expect to increase their number of machines from 52,000 to 60,000 by the end of the year. If you would like to see and try Virtuo, you can search for your nearest location on the TouchTunes website.

So what do you think? Will TouchTunes revive the jukebox? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.