Unlocking Retail Media

Michael Schuh, Global Head of Media at dunnhumby and former Kroger Precision Marketing leader, shares lessons from building and scaling retail media and customer data science. He discusses digitizing in-store media, keeping customer-first design, store-level personalization using shopper data, measurement and attribution challenges, and how agentic commerce and AI could reshape retail’s competitive moat.

James Avery is joined by Melissa Burdick, Co-founder and President of Pacvue, to discuss the complex, multi-touchpoint journey of the modern consumer. Melissa breaks down the three pillars of commerce media: discovery, retail media, and the emerging world of agentic commerce. She also explains why brands are shifting their focus from basic ROAS to sophisticated incrementality (iROAS) models. The conversation highlights the technical necessity of an "API-first" strategy for retailers to attract top-tier brand spend and explores how tools like Amazon’s Rufus and AI-powered assistants are reshaping discovery and increasing basket sizes.

Andrew Covato, founder of Growth by Science and former measurement lead at Google, Facebook, Netflix, and Snap, breaks down modern ad measurement. He contrasts platform-driven attribution with incrementality and MMM. He explains designing geo holdouts, calibrating models with experiments, and what retail media networks must provide for robust measurement.

James Borow, Comcast Universal Ads lead and ad-product veteran, explains making premium TV advertising accessible to all brands. He discusses lowering spend and creative barriers, new measurement approaches like incrementality, CTV’s halo on social, and AI-driven vibe coding and agentic commerce shaping personalized, on-demand video ads.

James Avery sits down with Ben Johnson, Senior Director of Chewy Ads, to discuss the critical role of product management in building a successful retail media network. Drawing from his experience at both Chewy and Coupang, Ben explains why retailers must move beyond "cookie-cutter" playbooks to develop bespoke ad solutions that reflect their unique customer behaviors—such as Chewy’s high-growth subscription model. The conversation explores how to build internal credibility with established teams, the importance of establishing a "good, neutral, bad" framework for experimentation, and why hiring product leaders with cognitive diversity is more effective than simply sourcing ad tech experts.

Sam Wright, strategic advisor at Kevel and former Klarna retail media lead who globalized Klarna Media. He walks through launching and scaling retail media businesses. Topics include shifting from trade dollars to measurable performance, aligning C-suite with product teams, carving org models for speed versus integration, leveraging SKU-level transaction data, and fintechs’ edge with first-party shopping data.

In this episode, James Avery talks with Gareth Menton of Carwow about his journey through retail media, moving from the transactional, spur-of-the-moment food delivery space at Just Eat to the high-value, long-consideration automotive marketplace. Gareth shares how Carwow uses rich first-party data for effective offsite advertising, proving sales attribution for brands. A key takeaway for all RMNs is his focus on making ads highly relevant to user intent, which has led to sponsored listings having the same click-through rate as organic listings.

Lee Dunbar, SVP and Head of Retail Media at Starcom, joins the show to provide a crucial agency and brand-side perspective on the evolving retail media landscape. Having seen retail media transform from old-school shopper marketing to a critical part of modern advertising, Lee discusses what major brands like P&G and Kraft Heinz truly seek from Retail Media Networks (RMNs), emphasizing the need for consistency, full-service capabilities, and audience-based incremental reach, especially in non-endemic and in-store environments. He argues that RMNs must mature into a media "layer" that integrates seamlessly with national media plans, rather than remaining siloed "channels". Looking ahead, Lee highlights that the biggest strategic shift for both agencies and brands is managing fragmented ad spend across numerous retailers while preparing for the impact of Agentic Commerce, which threatens to move discovery and media opportunities from retailer sites to AI agents who will act as "super shoppers".

Scot Wingo, a serial entrepreneur and founder of ChannelAdvisor, joins to tackle the impact of Agentic Commerce on Retail Media Networks. He discusses the evolution of large language models like ChatGPT into powerful marketplaces that disrupt traditional shopping channels. Wingo emphasizes the need for RMNs to enhance user experience, fix product catalogs, and rethink advertising strategies, using Instacart's success as a model. He urges retailers to adapt quickly, as even small losses to agentic commerce could lead to significant consequences.

In this discussion, Matt Nichols, a partner at Commerce Ventures and seasoned retail-tech investor, dives into the booming world of retail media and AI's transformative role. He highlights how COVID accelerated the shift to in-house retail media and why executives are prioritizing it as a revenue stream. Topics include AI-driven search optimization to boost ROI, the rise of agile supply chain models, and the creative potential of chat shopping as a future e-commerce frontier. Nichols also shares insights on Amazon's enduring advantage in fulfillment.