{"id":109981,"date":"2026-01-11T03:28:40","date_gmt":"2026-01-11T03:28:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2026\/01\/11\/retailers-dont-know-whats-in-their-stores-and-its-holding-commerce-media-back\/"},"modified":"2026-01-11T03:29:39","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T03:29:39","slug":"retailers-dont-know-whats-in-their-stores-and-its-holding-commerce-media-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2026\/01\/11\/retailers-dont-know-whats-in-their-stores-and-its-holding-commerce-media-back\/","title":{"rendered":"Retailers don\u2019t know what\u2019s in their stores \u2013 and it\u2019s holding commerce media back"},"content":{"rendered":"

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As a part of The Drum\u2019s Commerce Media Month, we meet up with SMG to speak in regards to the a part of commerce media most manufacturers nonetheless underestimate \u2013 the shop. With digital development leveling off, SMG argues that in-store now represents the largest untapped alternative for commerce media throughout the US.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Everybody\u2019s chasing commerce media {dollars} on-line. The actual combat, nevertheless, is about to maneuver into the shop.<\/p>\n

For the previous few years, commerce media has been nearly totally a digital story. On-site search. Off-site programmatic. Information pipes, dashboards and attribution fashions stacked on prime of each other. It\u2019s the place the simple cash was \u2013 and largely nonetheless is.<\/p>\n

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However as these channels mature, the extra consequential query is now not how manufacturers purchase commerce media on-line. It\u2019s what occurs subsequent \u2013 and more and more, the reply sits on the store ground.<\/p>\n

We caught up with SMG at CES 2026, the place a lot of the noise was about AI, automation and effectivity. But right here the dialog returned to one thing extra fundamental and tougher: bodily shops.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnly a few retailers truly know what their shops seem like inside,\u201d says Ollie Shayer, senior director of world technique and innovation at SMG. \u201cThey don\u2019t know what fixtureization they’ve, what stock exists, or what may even be monetized.\u201d<\/p>\n

That lack of knowledge is changing into a constraint. Digital commerce media has already taken the low-hanging fruit. Development now means coping with bodily actuality: 1000’s of shops, inconsistent layouts, legacy methods and environments that have been by no means designed to perform as media channels within the first place.<\/p>\n

SMG has spent years working in precisely that hole. Based within the UK in 2008 by Matt Lee and Joel Hopwood, each early figures within the monetization of loyalty knowledge by Dunnhumby, the enterprise was constructing in-store, at-till and shopper media lengthy earlier than \u201cretail media\u201d grew to become a boardroom phrase.<\/p>\n

That have shapes the way it reads the present US second.<\/p>\n

\u201cRetail media right here grew up digital-first,\u201d says Sean Crawford, managing director, North America at SMG. \u201cOn-site and off-site have been the simplest {dollars} to take. Now retailers are asking a tougher query: if I need to continue to grow, the place does the subsequent wave come from?\u201d<\/p>\n

More and more, the reply is the shop \u2013 however not within the simplistic method it\u2019s usually mentioned.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a bent to cut back the shop to a display screen,\u201d Crawford says. \u201cHowever the retailer is a complete atmosphere. Screens, audio, sampling, print, experiential \u2013 all of those are nonetheless purchased in silos within the US.\u201d<\/p>\n

That fragmentation creates friction for manufacturers. Shopping for in-store media usually means stitching collectively a number of distributors, measurement frameworks and incentives \u2013 all whereas hoping execution traces up with what\u2019s taking place elsewhere within the plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat will get misplaced,\u201d Crawford provides, \u201cis any sense of purchaser mission.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Need to go deeper? Ask The Drum<\/h4>\n


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That is the place the US finds itself at an inflection level. Digital commerce media is well-understood, well-staffed and well-automated. In-store is none of these issues. It’s operationally tougher, much less standardized and way more bodily.<\/p>\n

But it surely\u2019s additionally the place most buying nonetheless occurs.<\/p>\n

In markets that encountered this earlier, the lesson was not that in-store is glamorous, however that it must be handled as infrastructure.<\/p>\n

\u201cEarlier than you speak about media,\u201d Shayer says, \u201cyou must know what you\u2019ve truly obtained. What stock exists in your shops? What might be commercialized? What wants to remain for buying and selling or model messaging?\u201d<\/p>\n

Solely then do questions of expertise and measurement comply with.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been an over-fixation on one-to-one measurement,\u201d he says. \u201cHowever in-store is a one-to-many channel. You don\u2019t measure out of doors the identical method you measure social \u2013 and but that\u2019s what folks maintain attempting to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

His view is intentionally pragmatic. \u201cYou don\u2019t want excellent, one-to-one measurement to get an in-store retail media community operating. There\u2019s sufficient upside and sufficient proof from test-and-control to show incrementality. Ready for perfection simply slows development.\u201d<\/p>\n

That pragmatism extends to expertise. In-store doesn\u2019t should be theatrical in every single place to be efficient anyplace.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t do that throughout your whole property,\u201d Crawford says. \u201cYou choose flagship shops. Cities the place manufacturers need to present up. The influence is disproportionate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Examples vary from Tesco wrapping a retailer reverse Wembley Stadium for the Champions League last, to Kroger turning a pedestrian crossing into Oreos, to Boots creating experiential areas designed to stay past the shop through stay streaming and content material.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne retailer can generate column inches value their weight in gold,\u201d Shayer says. \u201cFor manufacturers, for retailers, and for the retail media community itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

The tougher half is making all of this buyable. \u201cProgrammatic is simple for company teams,\u201d Crawford says. \u201cNon-programmatic in-store media shouldn’t be. Retailers need to construct the pipes that permit their stock to be found, deliberate and transacted by the methods businesses already use.\u201d<\/p>\n

With out that, commerce media dangers recycling the identical budgets slightly than unlocking new ones. \u201cIf we don\u2019t make it straightforward,\u201d he says, \u201cincremental cash received\u2019t come into the business.\u201d<\/p>\n

That is additionally the place AI begins to matter \u2013 not as hype, however as plumbing. \u201cRetail media continues to be a really people-heavy enterprise,\u201d Shayer says. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t scale by simply including headcount. AI helps automate the toughest components \u2013 quicker planning, real-time optimization, adapting inventive to context like climate or occasions.\u201d<\/p>\n

The deeper shift, although, is cultural. \u201cThere\u2019s way more openness to partnership now,\u201d he says. \u201cRetailers are realizing they’ll\u2019t construct every thing themselves. They want orchestration slightly than possession.\u201d<\/p>\n

For US retailers, the message is changing into unavoidable. Digital commerce media alone won’t ship the subsequent section of development. That development sits in shops \u2013 messy, bodily, inconsistent, and nonetheless profoundly under-engineered.<\/p>\n

As Shayer places it: \u201cAny touchpoint that hyperlinks again to a degree of buy might be retail media. In that sense, all media is retail media \u2013 and all retail media is simply media.\u201d<\/p>\n

The subsequent chapter of commerce media received\u2019t be received by shouting louder about digital sophistication. Will probably be received by retailers lastly taking the shop critically \u2013 not as a relic, however as the toughest and Most worthy a part of the system.<\/p>\n

Commerce media is shifting quick. The Drum Awards for Commerce Media are right here to acknowledge the work maintaining tempo \u2013 and setting the usual. Be part of us in Miami in April as a part of The Drum\u2019s year-round Commerce Media program. <\/strong>Learn more and enter<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n