2024 Retail Media Awards

Kellen Axen
Director of Insights
Lowe’s One Roof Media Network

Over the past year, Kellen Axen was charged with staffing and developing the Retail Media Insights team for the Lowe’s One Roof Media Network (LORMN). His efforts focused on leading the development of a formalized learning-plan process with key client partners to help provide strategically valuable insights for brands. He also effectively created a structure to unlock custom insights for LORMN and for its clients tied to key knowledge areas, such as audience, creative, category, etc. Axen’s work also included partnering with the retailer’s data science and engineering technical partners to drive innovation around measurement foundations, while discovering new capabilities for the future such as customer analysis, LTV and platforms. He contributed to the IAB’s measurement standardization workstream to help set and develop industry standards in retail media measurement, and he’s involved with the Lowe’s Black Business Resource Group, mentoring others within the organization to help them reach their own goals. Axen is passionate about coaching and training, and he’s proud of his work standing up the insights function at LORMN — which then led to training and developing his team on what best-in-class insights look like. He teaches advertising and promotions at Bethel University as an adjunct instructor, passing along key learnings like the importance of measurement within media, objective/KPI alignment and other best practices to the next generation of advertisers within the industry. 

The next big trend in retail media is: Artificial intelligence.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: In-store. Specifically, in-store measurement insights.

The future of retail media is: Customer-centric — driven by deep customer insight.

Jacquelyn Baker
CEO
Omnicom Commerce

At the helm of Omnicom Commerce since July 2023, Jacquelyn Baker has a transformative vision that laid the groundwork for the creation of many successful connected commerce campaigns in the past year, including ZOA’s “Big Dwayne Energy,” an omnichannel platform with a commercial bias that drove demand and got retailers excited; Boar’s Head’s “How 2 Charcuterie,” which transformed a social trend into a shoppable consumer experience; and Pepsi Mini’s “I Wish I Was A Little Bit Smaller,” which synthesized a cultural insight with a commerce insight to drive e-commerce sales. Baker believes there is a need and potential for forging stronger connections between retailers, shoppers and brands. She has led the conversation on how retail media networks can shape the path to purchase, and she’s a speaker and thought leader on the power of data in retail media networks. Today, she is forging the strategy for Omnicom Commerce’s holding company to embrace a commerce-first approach across all platforms, transforming Omnicom from an advertising company to a sales and marketing company. Baker has streamlined the practice area agency portfolio, redefined agency responsibilities, branded the network uniting six leading commerce agencies and, joining forces with Flywheel, built a world-class network that is delivering hyper-specialized, end-to-end commerce experiences at scale as a repeatable pathway to growth. Uniting and harnessing specialized capabilities, including retail media, with both scale and expertise into a single-threaded entity is a strong focus for Baker and her team.

The next big trend in retail media is: Data-influenced targeting for non-endemics. There is a tremendous opportunity to leverage retailer first-party data to target category-relevant audiences with messaging for brands that are not sold within that specific retail channel from which the audiences were sourced. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Delivering brand-to-sales funnel collapsing. Consumers want what they want, when they want it. Shoppers are predisposed to look to retail channels online and in-store to research products and discover brands with the expectation that, if they choose to buy now, they can. The funnel collapses in that environment where the awareness, consideration and conversion occur in the same place, sometimes almost instantaneously. 

The future of retail media is: More retail media — expanding relevant reach. Retail media has ushered in what many are calling the third wave of media. It’s new and ever-evolving. The opportunity to try new things, learn faster and scale growth more quickly abounds. The data that powers retail media creates the platform where relevancy meets reach meets conversion.

Diane de la Baronniere
Global E-Commerce Media Director
Haleon

Diane de la Baronniere has served as Haleon’s head of e-commerce media for nearly two years, based in London. In the past year, she orchestrated a Digital Commerce week to engage all parts of the company, with nine sessions covering various topics from AI and data to social commerce adoption (with more than 1,000 attendees across the sessions). She also upskilled a wider team with a series of training from foundational topics including everything from “What is retail media?” to “How to drive best-in-class retail media partnerships.” She built and delivered the company’s first retail media strategy for markets to embrace the opportunity and leverage media to strengthen their relationship with the different retailers. She also developed and is rolling out a media sufficiency budget model to support its local markets in creating a budget aligned with their growth and acceleration ambitions. De la Baronniere has concentrated her efforts in reinforcing and updating Haleon’s retail media strategy and has delivered a data one-stop-shop for local markets to be able to make informed decisions when it comes to budget, investment, pace, etc., as well as performances and lower funnel impact measurement. She has effectively brought more knowledge and expertise to local teams throughout the company’s internal live community, growing their common understanding and sharing learnings and best practices. Finally, she has narrowed in on specific market and brand mixes to deliver focused sessions and support in an effort to scale up learnings and insights.

The next big trend in retail media is: Data standardization. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Full-funnel attribution measurement. 

The future of retail media is: To be fully integrated in media plans.

Andrea Benning
Retail Media Manager, Nutrition
Unilever

Andrea Benning joined Unilever in her current post in October 2022. Since then, she has overseen the successful implementation of the retail media practice within the ice cream and nutrition digital media commerce hubs at the company, including the establishment of new processes and a stronger focus on media operations. She says the successful execution of these initiatives was made possible through collaboration with her retail media colleagues across various business units. Their collective efforts have culminated in the establishment of a best-in-class retail media force, positioning Unilever as a preeminent media powerhouse of the future. By overseeing and analyzing media initiatives across an extensive portfolio of more than 18 retailers, and approaching it from a holistic business unit perspective, Benning was able to deliver impartial investment recommendations grounded in data. This involved the systematic utilization of brand KPI and audience frameworks, ensuring campaign consistency and providing a clear basis to ascertain the success or failure of Unilever media endeavors.

The next big trend in retail media is: Shoppable recipes. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Unified measurement. 

The future of retail media is: End-to-end marketing.

Paul Brenner
Senior Vice President, Retail Media & Partnerships
Vibenomics, a Mood Media company

Paul Brenner supports retailers in delivering effective advertising solutions by leveraging ad tech to implement audio, digital and experiential advertising in-store. His recent work has focused on the standardization of in-store tech, measurement and attribution. His work with the IAB has centered around in-store — defining the media type, its measurement objectives and its targeting tactics, considering the current fragmented state of gathering data and measuring effectiveness. In the IAB’s recent Retail Media Measurement Guidelines, Brenner took a step toward in-store standardization by defining the taxonomy of in-store zones. Laying the foundation for retailers, he defined the general requirements for in-store measurement and reporting parameters. Brenner continues to establish and standardize in-store opportunities, from activation to measurement. He was the “In-Store” team lead for the IAB’s 2023 Retail Media Buyer’s Guide. This guide is the first industry-wide, unified guide defining retail media, measurement objectives and targeting metrics. Brenner was also a main contributor for the IAB/MRC Retail Media Measurement Guidelines and primary author of “Chapter 6: In-Store Digital Place-Based (DPB) Environments Measurement,” where the general requirements for in-store measurement and reporting parameters for in-store were defined; and for the IAB’s In-Store Playbook and primary author of “Chapter 4: Advanced Measurement & Optimization,” which will enable and educate retailers, agencies and brands on the DOOH and in-store opportunity in retail media, from activation to measurement. Brenner also established a partnership with Microsoft Advertising, leading the way for omnichannel closed-loop reporting. The effort measured joint exposure to digital in-store and onsite tactics and created an end result that proves the effectiveness of brands leveraging omnichannel solutions within retail media strategies.

The next big trend in retail media is: Providers will adopt standardized systems, offering scalability and smooth integration. Retailers will refine their digital investments. Advertisers will begin demanding closed-loop measurement across onsite, offsite and in-store tactics. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: In-store digital is poised to reinvent brick-and-mortar marketing. The shift toward more targeted and contextually relevant advertising reestablishes in-store advertising as a vital component to any retail media strategy that serves consumers with engaging experiences, digitizes shopping journeys and monetizes retailers’ in-store media. 

The future of retail media is: RMNs will soon lead the “Always On” revolution — an uninterrupted, programmatic approach via digital channels to enhance shopper experiences, create dynamic content and standardized measurement, and connect with audiences in a more personalized way.

Chance Chapman
EVP, Growth, Innovation and Media
VML Commerce

Chance Chapman leads the integration of creative commerce into retail media, emphasizing creativity as a crucial multiplier of clients’ investments. He has worked to deliver relevant, actionable, measurable media activations to consumers where they are, at the right time, across all retail media platforms and digital channels. Recent work includes the award-winning retail media campaign, OreoCodes, a commerce experience that taps into the minimalistic similarity between bar codes and a stack of Oreos, allowing customers to get offers directly from its all-time complementary partner, milk, that are redeemable at retail locations. Another recent effort was Lucky Charmology, where consumers scan their cereal bowl using technology created by VML’s in-house tech lab, which reveals a personalized fortune based on the magical charms in their bowl. The program has seen successful brand engagement with Lucky Charms while also turning every fortune into a repeat usage occasion, encouraging repeat purchases in partnership with Target. Chapman is an active member of the IAB Retail Media Measurement Group, where he contributes to establishing industry-wide retail media measurement guidelines and developing solutions that improve the interactive advertising and marketing ecosystem. In January, IAB unveiled the final version of the Retail Media Measurement Guidelines, a testament to collaborative expertise and industry-wide consensus. This comprehensive framework is not just a set of standards but a roadmap to enhanced transparency and consistency in retail media measurement.

The next big trend in retail media is: 1. Unified commerce approach. The shift from silos of e-commerce, customer and brand teams to a truly holistic approach, emphasizing seamless consumer experiences.

2. Convergence of retail models. The merging of first-party online retailer and marketplace models, driving strategic shifts in retail media to support diverse sellers and sophisticated, brand-centric advertising campaigns.

3. Balancing supplier and retailer relationships. Finding balance as suppliers seek more value from their investments in retail media and retailers seek increased investments from suppliers. Addressing the complexity of comparing trends across different retail media networks requires cohesive strategies and industry standards to maintain and strengthen these crucial partnerships. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: The rise of creative commerce, where innovative, brand-centric solutions are driving both sales results and brand love. This approach integrates creativity with commerce strategies, demonstrating that compelling, award-winning campaigns can effectively enhance consumer engagement and boost sales, setting a new standard for excellence in the industry.

The future of retail media is: Up and to the right. As retail media continues to evolve and expand, it will play an increasingly pivotal role in the commerce ecosystem, driving innovation and delivering measurable outcomes. Retail media spend is projected to reach $129 billion in the U.S. by 2028, driving the increasing importance of data quality and technology advancements to enable better targeting, measurement and optimization capabilities across various ad channels.

Charlene Charles
Head of DG Media Network Operations
Dollar General

Charlene Charles sits at the helm of the Dollar General Media Network (DGMN), overseeing advertising opportunities on Meta properties, launching digital media marketing campaigns, running sponsored product ads (powered by Criteo) and onsite direct ads, telling DG stories within the DG App, and offering unique landing page experiences on DG.com. She understands the increased need for accelerating the omnichannel experience, and that brands must reach shoppers at the right place and time through its retail media networks. Charles and her team ensure that DGMN is providing its brands with access to real-time data to help them serve DG’s unique customer base across 20,000 stores in 48 states, delivering more than 2 billion transactions annually. DGMN stands out for its ability to offer brands access to hard-to-reach customers who might potentially be overlooked with traditional digital marketing tactics, creating more meaningful connections, a smoother experience and a more customized path to purchase. A recent example of DGMN successfully harnessing the power of data is in its partnership with Meta. Through it, advertisers reach DG’s more than 90 million unique customer profiles across the Meta ecosystem, which includes Facebook and Instagram News Feeds, Stories and Reels. Using this measurement and analysis, DGMN can evaluate the business impact of Meta marketing investments to a particular brand and uncover new insights, inclusive of quantifiable metrics such as return on ad spend, as compared to more traditional and directional metrics such as intent to buy.

The next big trend in retail media is: To create scaled unique/unified omnichannel experiences. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Identifying authentic opportunities and strategies.

The future of retail media is: In the data for deeper insights and higher ROI.

Parbinder Dhariwal
Vice President, General Manager
CVS Media Exchange

Over the past year, Parbinder Dhariwal led the team at CVS Media Exchange that has been committed to helping brands and consumers connect through expansive reach, access to real people, transparent reporting and actionable insights. Dhariwal played a significant role in revamping the CMX brand in an effort to amplify brand exposure and perception, and he spearheaded the launch of a data clean room collaboration with Pinterest and LiveRamp. Other key projects included enhancing CMX Performance Dashboard capabilities for supplier partners to include daily engagement and sales metrics, and working to maintain and grow CMX team/talent retention and cultivated cross-functional collaboration. Dhariwal has also contributed to expanding CMX’s commitment to campaign data transparency through precise sales attribution and stronger campaign optimization for partners. To achieve this, he has been focused on driving strategic partnerships with credible organizations to help enable innovation through collaboration, including working with the IAB and a coalition of other retail media networks to define standardization metrics and methods for measurement practices in the retail media network industry. The impact of CMX’s partnership with the IAB is pushing the industry to hold it accountable to higher measurement standards and promote comparative campaign results.

The next big trend in retail media is: Measurement standardization across all retail media networks.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: In-store personalization at scale. 

The future of retail media is: Seamless, omnichannel campaigns, online to in-store.

Melissa Emerich
Chief of Staff, Director of Strategy & Revenue Management
Peapod Digital Labs/AD Retail Media

Melissa Emerich led the rebranding and re-introduction of AD Retail Media to the market. The rebrand campaign was crucial as the industry continues its rapid growth with new retail media networks launching all the time. She strategized a brand relaunch campaign with a limited budget and a challenging timeline, and rolled out new branding, including a logo and tagline, a website, a social media campaign and earned media PR spotlights. Because of these efforts, AD Retail Media is recognized among other retail media networks that have been around for more than 15 years. Emerich says innovation is always on the team’s mind, and a highlight of this past year has been planning the organization’s go-to-market strategy around new products such as shoppable short-form video as well as building out its broader sales enablement strategy. With the explosion of retail media networks over the past three years resulting in a more crowded marketplace, she realized that AD Retail Media was not appearing in industry reports and rankings, likely because it was lacking a “brand.” She developed a new logo and tagline and started marketing through social campaigns and earned media spotlights. Her efforts led to AD Retail Media jumping to the No. 5 overall CPG ranked RMN in Insider Intelligence’s 2023 rankings.

The next big trend in retail media is: Customer-centric experiences such as in-store digital signage. There has been so much attention over the past few years for digital advertising and digital inventory that companies have lost sight of how to connect with customers in a more meaningful way while they are shopping in the physical store. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: From a revenue perspective, non-endemic advertising. Customers want to extend their shopping experience beyond groceries. Retailers can offer those products in a way that does not disrupt the customer experience but enhances it.

The future of retail media is: Strategic integration of innovative technology will redefine the way companies optimize and bring campaigns to life in the next two years.

Oz Etzioni 
CEO & Co-Founder
Clinch

Oz Etzioni leads operations for the company’s Flight Control platform that enables retail media networks to provide speed and scale to their organizations and brand advertisers along with creative engagement insights that are utilized in real-time for audience enrichment/segmentation, creative and media optimization and more. Etzioni built Flight Control to be open and agile, to work with any pillar of a retail media network’s tech stack, and perfectly complement internal processes, assets, etc. Over the past year, he enhanced Flight Control with a series of Gen-AI powered features that bring even more efficiency and automation to the campaign activation lifecycle, from strategy to optimization, including the ability to automatically generate campaign strategies with multi-layer decisioning logic from a written prompt, automate the way creatives are built, edited and scaled at unprecedented speed with superior accuracy, and query reporting, access knowledge and acquire insights in an instant. Clinch was awarded “Most Innovative Use of GenAI” by Business Intelligence Group; locked in new deals to support omnichannel ad serving + DCO (dynamic creative optimization) with Fortune 500 retailers; and contributed to several retail-media-network-focused IAB initiatives, such as Buyers Guide to RMN, and RMN’s guide to shoppable CTV. Etzioni also built a framework for retail media networks to enable truly seamless, largely automated, omnichannel campaign activation that also enriches and amplifies their first-party audiences at massive scale.

The next big trend in retail media is: Seamless connectivity. 

he most exciting opportunity in retail media is: The way it has shaped the advertising ecosystem.   

The future of retail media is: Speed and scale unlike ever before, driven by data.

Lauren Fleischer
Vice President, Growth Marketing, ELC Online
Estee Lauder Cos.

Lauren Fleischer was named to her current post just more than a year ago. Since then, she has enhanced the retail media capabilities at Estee Lauder Cos. by recruiting a team of retail media professionals. She also in-housed key areas of North American retail media execution, achieving double-digit ROAS growth and substantial sales impact. She led the company’s digital-first partnerships with retailers and negotiated key joint business plans, resulting in advanced measurement capabilities and improved ROI, and spearheaded a turnaround effort for a valued retail partner, driving more than 10% growth in online sales through collaboration with the retailer’s emerging media network. She says the ELC Online’s digital growth marketing team is embedded within its regions that collaborate closely with its brands to optimize their retail media investment. This group has been instrumental in accelerating Estee Lauder Cos. retail media acumen in several areas, she notes, from refining media execution and measurement to establishing strategic partnerships with its valued retail partners. The team’s focus has been not only to enhance ELC’s presence, but also to set the bar for performance and collaboration in the beauty industry’s emerging retail media landscape.

The next big trend in retail media is: Embracing automation to dynamically target consumers, personalize messaging, automate reporting and reduce workload for retailers and advertisers.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: The opportunity to transform the reputation of retail marketing, from being perceived as an afterthought to becoming a powerful, measurable marketing channel.

The future of retail media is: Measurable, scalable and prepared for a cookie-free world.

Edwin Fu
Founder and CEO
Placements.io

Edwin Fu founded Placements.io, a modern revenue management platform for sellers of digital advertising, more than 11 years ago. He points to several of the company’s efforts over the past year, including Storefront, its white-labeled, self-service portal that clients can use to expand advertising sales to small- and medium-sized buyers. Another is the addition of a new product, code-named “Campfire.” Fu and his team reverse-engineered its order management system and developed a tool for marketers to streamline the planning, buying and activation of omnichannel advertising. Campfire empowers brands to in-house media buying and boosts productivity and profitability for agencies as well. Fu is also very optimistic about the introduction of AI across its platform. The company is deploying AI capabilities to drive automation and more quickly provide insights. He says AI is a large focus, and customers will be seeing more on that front this year. Fu is also working on unlocking scale and revenue as retailers are tasked with spinning up media businesses quickly. Empowering those retailers to set the operational foundations that unlock efficiencies, support best practices and power sales performance helps them more quickly and confidently scale and recognize their revenue potential.

The next big trend in retail media is: Scaling. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Attribution from real customer sales.

The future of retail media is: The third wave of advertising and scale.

Shannon Hartmann
Group Director, Activation and Market Planning
Kroger Precision Marketing/84.51

Serving as director of programmatic buying since early 2022 and assuming her current post in April, Shannon Hartman has led Kroger Precision Marketing’s media-buying in-housing initiative that achieved significant enhancements in both display iROAS and aROAS, leading to notable increases in sales lift. This success highlights her team’s proficiency in optimizing ad performance and prioritizing meaningful ad experiences for Kroger shoppers. She had also spearheaded innovative strategies that led to a significant increase in iROAS and household penetration rates on a specific social media platform, showcasing adeptness in leveraging platform dynamics to expand reach and drive returns, which underscores proficiency in maximizing the unique characteristics of social media audiences for effective growth. She says she and her team achieved notable success by driving long-term sales growth and enhancing shopper value while effectively managing industry media benchmarks. Following KPM’s in-housing transition, significant improvements were observed in key metrics including increased click-through rates, enhanced viewability, higher engagement rates and a rise in the volume of managed campaigns. Hartmann also oversaw the efforts to implement best practices and industry standards to achieve retail media-buying success, such as rigorous data analysis leveraging advanced analytics tools; optimized budget allocation; negotiating strategic partnerships; and proactive optimization with continuous monitoring and adjustment of campaign performance that ensured maximum exposure and engagement. As a result, KPM has achieved more efficient allocation of advertising budgets, eliminating waste and redirecting resources to channels and placements that yield tangible results.

The next big trend in retail media is: A serious focus on sustainability. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: AI. Leveraging AI in media buying enables insights. 

The future of retail media is: Accountable. Vanity metrics are going extinct.

Evan Hovorka
Vice President of Product and Innovation
Albertsons Media Collective

Evan Hovorka joined Albertsons Cos. in October 2021 as head of products and innovation and charged with building and scaling a modern retail media product suite. In his current post since March 2023, he has since launched a first-to-market, closed-loop measurement in a cleanroom, with Pinterest and Liveramp driving incremental results. He also launched a first-to-market CTV capability with NBCu, Google DV360, PAIR ID and Liveramp to unlock retail-media-network-specific capabilities to improve brand CTV campaign scale and performance, and launched a self-serve product allowing brands to leverage more flexible access to retail media network assets, like audiences and closed-loop measurement. Hovorka also launched and recorded two seasons of The Garage Podcast, a retail media podcast inspired by a collaboration and innovation mindset with the intent of simplifying the sometimes-complex retail media ecosystem. Guests include leaders from Pinterest, Google, Criteo, NBCu/Freewheel, Fetch, the CPG Guys and Kargo. Through collaborative partnerships and a passion to improve the retail media network ecosystem, Hovorka has also been able to reshape products with top ad-tech companies in a way that removes friction for brands, improves transparency, pushes standardization and expands the full potential of the industry. Specifically, he created cleanroom, identity, social media transparency and merchant/RMN solutions that continue to lead the industry.

The next big trend in retail media is: The ultimate goal of retail media is supporting CPGs with the full power of a major retailer. This extends far beyond media and integrates merchandising, price and promotions, in store, standardization and flexible service models. There has been a shift of RMNs to be fully integrated and progressive in partnerships and products.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Each CPG brand is unique and demands flexible RMN solutions that create minimal friction for their in-house teams, agencies and shopper marketing teams. The Collective wants to play a role in every media channel a CPG plays in, bringing more value to be gained for all parties through consistent insights, audiences or measurement. 

The future of retail media is: The retail media industry has a ceiling, but progressive retailers that co-design a full spectrum of services, insights and activations can break through that ceiling, unlocking even more mutually beneficial value with the CPG brands and agencies they partner with.

Matthew Lee
Co-Founder, Chief Growth Officer
Threefold (SMG)

As co-founder and chief growth officer of the entire SMG agency network, Matthew Lee has been focused on growing and maintaining its diverse portfolio of retail media network partners. He helped beat aggressive growth expectations for U.K. grocery retailer Morrisons during its first year with a Threefold-powered retail media network, and also helped relaunch top convenience retailer Co-op’s retail media proposition as Co-op Media Network. Lee’s efforts also helped to win and transition Asda (top 5 U.K. grocer) to a Threefold-powered retail media network, which involved onboarding experts and Plan-Apps, Threefold’s proprietary retail media operating system that powers all of its retailer partners’ networks. Asda marked his 10th sell-side partnership win since founding the SMG agency network more than 15 years ago. He further led the team in North America to expand SMG to the continent under the Threefold brand, regularly attending major retail events and meeting with major retailers in the U.S. and Canada to discuss how Threefold can build or strengthen their retail media strategies. By transitioning Asda to a Threefold model, onboarding Plan-Apps and strengthening its brand identity under the newly minted LS Eleven Media Services name, it has set one of the largest grocery retailers in the U.K. on a path toward significant and sustainable retail media growth. Asda will now offer targeted, customer-centric, creative and measurable omnichannel campaigns that help brands reach the right audience through the right touchpoints, whether in-store, online, TV, social and other digital channels.

The next big trend in retail media is: Greater data collaboration partnerships. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: The store. 

The future of retail media is: Omnichannel: In-store, online and offsite.

Cassie Mabe
E-Commerce Director
The Fresh Market

Cassie Mabe launched the U.S.’s first-ever Shoppable Video-Live Commerce Retail Media Network for The Fresh Market this past year, recognizing the potential of leveraging short- and long-form shoppable video livestreams to create a virtual shopping experience that closely replicates the in-store sensory experience. This approach has enabled The Fresh Market to actively engage with e-commerce grocery enthusiasts and consumers, fostering a compelling and inspiring customer journey while yielding results that included more than $10 million in livestream attributable revenue through December 2023, $800,000 in committed retail media network revenue in 2023, and more than $1 million in retail media network revenue already secured for 2024. This amounted to securing 63 contracted brand sponsorship packages in 2023 and an additional 55 for 2024. By introducing this first-of-its-kind retail media network to the market, Mabe has positioned The Fresh Market as a thought leader in the retail tech space. The company has enabled a fully integrated customer experience that seamlessly bridges the gap between the immersive in-store shopping journey and the online realm, and her leadership role in the shoppable livestream video program has garnered industry-wide recognition. 

The next big trend in retail media is: Video.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: AI for enhanced targeting and ad relevance.

The future of retail media is: In stores (phygital retail).

Anne Martin
Director, Shopper Marketing
Mondelez International

A more than eight-year veteran of Mondelez International, Anne Martin assumed her current role in April 2022. She points to her work on an OreoCodes test-and-learn program that leveraged proprietary image recognition technology as a key initiative in the past year. She and her team worked in partnership with Albertsons Media Collective tools and assets to drive the program, which has been highly successful and, to date, has garnered 70 industry awards. The technology has since been repurposed to create other meaningful tech-forward programming, including a belVita program at Target in partnership with Roundel. Martin is continuously testing and learning new capabilities. An alpha test with Albertsons Media Collective and Pinterest on a Mondelez clean room test proved to be very informative and encouraged thinking of new ways to partner with third parties and retail media networks. Martin is a member of the Albertsons Media Collective Client Council, which affords her the opportunity to provide feedback of upcoming capabilities and a willingness to run test-and-learns. She reviews capabilities not just from a Mondelez perspective but also in the industry and compared to other retail media networks.

The next big trend in retail media is: Measurement consistencies implemented. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Integration with an in-store/full omnichannel experience.

The future of retail media is: Advanced targeting and personalization driven by AI.

Katie McBrien
Senior Vice President, Commerce
Spark Foundry WW

As the senior vice president of commerce since April, Katie McBrien is an advocate for creating new processes to be able to deliver work at the highest level of efficiency. She is driving conversations across clients to bring planning to a higher holistic level, bringing shopper and traditional media teams together. She has led the Shelf Intelligent Media vision, strategy and implementation across several large CPG clients, which is inclusive of leveraging Profitero digital shelf technology paired with retail media network media automations both on and offsite to deliver the future of retail media performance. McBrien has also led innovation in the alcoholic beverage space, including its first-ever Retailer Media Prioritization Tool and innovation in media with BevAlc delivery partners. Her work on retail media network audience integrations through Walmart Luminate, Kroger Stratum and Amazon Marketing Cloud with national media has delivered increased performance, de-duplication of campaigns and efficiencies. McBrien has been a leader in the commerce industry for a decade with a full complement of agency and client side roles in shopper, e-commerce and now retail media. Most recently, she is leading large CPG clients into modern holistic commerce marketing, investment and optimization in her current role. 

The next big trend in retail media is: Data transparency – pushing retailers to be more transparent with the data they share. As the company strives toward a holistic planning model across many of its teams, there is a need to be able to truly understand who it is reaching and where. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Integration of retail data through clean rooms. By integrating advertiser first-party and retail media data into a single clean room, the team will be able to more efficiently and effectively reach audiences that are most likely to convert while managing overlap and duplication.

 The future of retail media is: Incrementality. Having a true understanding of the incrementality its media is driving is at the center of many of McBrien’s conversations.

Elizabeth Marsten
Vice President, Innovation & Growth, Commerce Media
Tinuiti

Elizabeth Marsten joined Tinuiti in 2019, serving the marketplace strategic services team. She assumed her current post in early 2023 and is a regular contributor to Adweek, with almost 20 published pieces that delve into retail media trends, tactics and traps. Her most recent article is on the change in search, explaining that the industry is moving into the discovery phase of the funnel, not just a list of links to dig deeper into. Her argument is that search is getting broader and results are getting more detailed, but fewer, and involving more features like video, lists, basket-building recommendations and augmented reality-type pop outs. But it all still sits in a search results page. Another topic focuses on the opportunity that Amazon and other retailers have for non-endemic advertisers in sectors of business that are not e-commerce. Marsten believes that first-party data collected by these retailers over the last few decades can change the business-to-consumer-lead generation space for marketing in a very disruptive, but positive way. She continues to push the status quo, challenging retailers and brands to prepare and take advantage of a fast-paced and still maturing industry. Marsten says it’s important to ask questions and provide context because if one retailer or platform has a feature or different measurement standard that the other doesn’t and there isn’t a general understanding of what that means or how the teams can compensate, catch up or challenge, we won’t move forward as an industry.

The next big trend in retail media is: Non-endemic advertising self-service. ... Making the vast amounts of data that Amazon has, across so many properties and over years of collection, self-service allows these service-based businesses access to a completely new way of lead and awareness generation.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Gen Alpha and in-store shopping experiences with massive potential. Gen Alpha’s buying power is already unprecedented, and they are shaping the way we will shop in the future since they are overly comfortable with screen experiences, mobile access and internet access. And they are growing up with AI.

The future of retail media is: Search. Even with all our enhancements in more screens, interactive experiences, QR codes and AI, we, as humans, still have a basic need to search. ... We need that search bar, wherever it is.

Robin Neufeld
Director of Marketing
Loblaw Cos. Limited

Robin Neufeld helped to launch a consolidated retail media network at Loblaw that merged retail insights, loyalty and media into a unified suite for partners. She also led the go-to-market planning and launch of a number of media product solutions, including the launch of its national in-store screens network, and grocery audio ad network this past year. She partnered with the Path to Purchase Institute to bring the Retail Media Summit to Canada and supported the advent of the first-ever Mars Agency Retail Media Report card. Neufeld is also working to elevate the profile of retail media in the Canadian media industry, helping to shift it from an emerging space to the mainstream in media and marketing circles, and focused on helping marketers and media agencies navigate the fast-evolving retail media space with educational content and industry activities.

The next big trend in retail media is: Supercharged video. Connected TV viewing is on the rise, which is exciting for marketers since video is a trusted format for effective brand storytelling. Coupling video with the purchase-based audience targeting available from retail media networks presents the opportunity to make it even more effective by better connecting brands’ messages with the most receptive consumers.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Its potential to reinvent brand marketing.

The future of retail media is: Omnichannel + incremental (impact). Investments in retail media have skewed toward low-funnel digital tactics like sponsored products. However, with the broad range of media channels and formats available from omnichannel retail media networks like Advance powered by Loblaw, brands can now build marketing campaigns that connect with customers in meaningful moments both online and in-store across all stages of the path to purchase. For the potential of retail media to be realized, we as an industry must not only make it easier to build 360-degree campaigns that come to life consistently throughout the omnichannel purchase journey, but also make it possible to measure the full, true impact of these multi-touch omnichannel campaigns.

Chris Riegel
CEO/Founder of Stratacache
PRN, a Stratacache company

Chris Riegel has served as PRN’s CEO for more than 25 years. He says the past year has produced dozens of new in-store retail media projects in the U.K., Europe, U.S. and Canada. Many of the company’s largest retail customers are in the test-and-learn phase of in-store retail media, determining which areas of their store can be activated with in-store media, defining and refining the content and monetization strategy, and moving into large-scale rollout. And to Riegel, the most exciting projects are those in which retailers have already scaled their in-store retail media network capabilities and are leveraging their existing networks as a critical component of retail media network revenue growth, using their data and AI to deliver personalized shopper messaging at scale. Riegel’s efforts in driving focus to in-store and streaming as onsite and mobile retail media networks have matured has been impactful. Retail media networks leverage in-store data, paired with smart digital displays, which unlock the media power of the in-store audience across all channels, including connected TV, which is the fastest-growing major ad channel in the U.S.

The next big trend in retail media is: Sensors for direct attribution. Using advanced sensors, the company creates session ID’s for all shopper pathing, which can be tied back to loyalty or transaction data at the register. This gives retailers the power to build audiences based on in-store shopping behavior and present compelling offers to encourage immediate online conversion or for use during the customer’s next in-store visit. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Fully connecting media to a proven customer action by tracking impressions, engagement, conversion and sale. 

 The future of retail media is: Sentient stores that provide a consumer shopping experience in a physical retail store where advanced sensors receive real-time dynamic data signals and AI provides real-time and predictive knowledge of the store, the inventory, the shopper and the journey. This allows in-store media to be localized and personalized and delivers full-funnel attribution. Tracking a store like a website opens up an ability to radically improve the shopping experience for shoppers, while increasing product and category activation. This “unlocks” the retail media network capabilities of the physical store.

Melissa Salas
Director of Marketing
ShopPremiumOutlets.com (a Simon Malls company)

Melissa Salas heads up the marketing efforts for ShopPremiumOutlets.com (SPO). This past year, Simon Malls doubled its performance-based partnerships, including top-performing influencer marketing networks, thereby expanding its reach through brand advocates of SPO. This strategy not only enhances brand advocacy but also drives sales through trusted voices. Her team also developed and launched its “Be You With Us” brand and customer influencer program and platform, where customers can join and share their favorite products on the SPO and get paid for their influence. The initiative fosters a sense of community and loyalty among its customer base while also driving user-generated content and engagement. Salas also led efforts to introduce its AI shopping assistant to help shoppers find anything they want, along with a photo search feature where users can upload any photo and the company will match the “look” as well as its color search feature for those seeking something very specific. It has partnered with BNPL (Buy Now, Pay Later) providers Klarna and Afterpay, and has added Catch to a growing list of payment options for shoppers. All these key projects have been incorporated into the company’s marketing strategies and media execution.

The next big trend in retail media is: Social commerce.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: AI shopping.

The future of retail media is: Voice commerce.

Megan Santella
Director, Retail Media Operations
RedMedia (a Hy-Vee company)

Megan Santella has spent her entire career at Hy-Vee in a variety of roles. Over the past year, she was instrumental in building and designing the retailer’s new retail media network, RedMedia. One of her most significant accomplishments involved developing a cross-functional end-to-end workflow process that centralized and operationalized all data, assets and brand accounts for its internal teams. She also helped develop the retailer’s monetization and go-to-market strategies as it introduced RedMedia to the marketplace in the fall of 2023. She was named to her current post in December. As the team continued to advance RedMedia’s capabilities, Santella has worked closely with the retailer’s technology teams, as well as third-party partners, to develop and operationalize its diverse full-funnel media offerings such as sponsored product advertising with Prodx, offsite and onsite media options, and in-store advertising through options like in-store audio and digital video boards. She believes her strength in building strong and lasting relationships with brand partners has been highly impactful this past year. As a retail media network, the entire operating model is centered around the organization’s brand partners and their needs. At RedMedia, the team serves as its brand partners’ advocate and advisor, working together to maximize their marketing dollars with strategic placement and messaging that will resonate with targeted consumer groups.

The next big trend in retail media is: AI, as well as cost-per-conversion modeling.

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: The continued evolution of closed-loop reporting.

The future of retail media is: Evolving, exciting and all about data.

Oliver Shayer
Omni-Media Director
Boots

Since joining Boots Media Group (BMG) three years ago, Oliver Shayer has played a pivotal role in its creation and growth, leveraging the extensive first-party data from Boots’ loyalty program. Recently, he worked to implement a digital infrastructure, with rapid deployment of digital screens and audio systems across Boots stores that dramatically enhanced the in-store customer and advertising experience. The introduction and launch of “Audience360,” an innovative digital tool that enables suppliers to utilize first-party data across various platforms with comprehensive measurement, marked a significant advancement in targeted advertising and ROI assessment. Shayer also points to the expansion of strategic media partnerships with major media entities like ITV, Channel 4 and Sky, which integrated Boots data with broadcaster video on demand inventory, significantly expanding advertising opportunities for suppliers. Also, over the past year, BMG managed collaborations with more than 650 brands across more than 5,000 campaigns. Shayer’s support for the creation and implementation of the ISBA Retail Media Framework has impacted the retail media landscape by advocating for standardization within the U.K.’s retail media industry and setting benchmarks for consistency and reliability. His efforts in forging strong partnerships with a range of the largest suppliers in the beauty, health and general merchandise categories have been crucial. These relationships have created a network of trust, support and shared goals, which have not only enhanced BMG’s strategic positioning but have also played a pivotal role in the success and evolution of retail media by enriching the collaborative ecosystem.

The next big trend in retail media is: Advanced analytics for retail media using AI. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Seamless omnichannel experiences.

The future of retail media is: Deeper collaboration with the brand partners.

MK Woltz
Director, Media Connections
Danone North America

Over the past year, MK Woltz has led new ways of working across Danone North America’s marketing and sales teams to integrate its retail media approach, which resulted in developing comprehensive joint business plans with leading customers to create additional value for the company. She also led and executed two first-to-market retail media betas for TikTok and Premium CTV that delivered increased sales and household penetration for the company’s brands. Woltz has played a pivotal role in integrating retailer media into Danone North America’s overall marketing strategy. By emphasizing the importance of retail media, she has unlocked execution opportunities and helped the organization understand the power of national media in harmony with retailer media. As a thought leader, she not only trained the entire sales organization but also educated brand marketers on the significance of retail media and how to use the platform for maximum impact. She developed training to upskill the shopper marketing team to better understand media principles, and her efforts have empowered the team to leverage retail media effectively and increase support year over year.

The next big trend in retail media is: Digital expansion in physical stores. 

The most exciting opportunity in retail media is: Data, insights and measuring the impact.

The future of retail media is: Continued focus on video in and out of stores.