PIPEDOWN

Pipedown helped persuade Gatwick Airport to drop unwanted piped music in its public areas and Sainsbury and Tesco not to install background music in their branches (except, alas, at Christmas). Pipedown was behind the decision by Waterstones booksellers, the UK's biggest booksellers' chain, to phase piped music out of their branches. In June 2016, Marks and Spencer was persuaded by concerted letter-writing from Pipedowners to drop its piped music - proof that persistent yet polite pressure can and does work... Pipedown is currently pressing for legislation (both in the Westminster Parliament and in the Scottish Parliament) to ban unwanted piped music and television in hospitals where patients, perhaps lying immobilised on beds or stretchers, may be literally powerless to escape it.