Retail Media Breakfast Club

In this episode, I take you inside one of the most innovative retail media activations I’ve seen yet: Sam’s Club’s “Race to the Club” and their bold sponsorship at the IndyCar season finale. Instead of focusing solely on digital shelf space like most retail media networks, Sam’s Club is leaning into live experiences—concerts, county fairs, racing events—and turning them into opportunities for real...

Conferences are expensive: flights, hotels, and registration fees all add up fast. But the brands who see real ROI from industry events know that the biggest wins don’t happen in the keynote sessions. In this episode, I’m sharing strategies from four brand leaders who’ve figured out how to turn those hefty investments into long-term partnerships, insights, and business growth. You’ll hear why skip...

Retail media may be the hottest topic in advertising right now, but how do big agencies really feel about it? In this episode, I unpack new Infillion research that reveals the complicated love-hate relationship agencies have with retail media. On the surface, agencies are excited about its potential. But dig deeper and you’ll find a story of frustration, structural challenges, and competing priori...

The world of shopping is changing fast and loyalty programs are right at the center of it. In this episode, I share expert insights from Stephanie Meltzer-Paul, a veteran loyalty expert and the brains behind the So Many Points newsletter, and dive into how artificial intelligence is reshaping the way brands connect with customers. I also explore how loyalty programs are evolving from simple point...

Last week I shared some surprising new research: AI shopping agents are actively penalizing sponsored products, reducing the likelihood of them being selected by 8–14%. That sounds like a big red flag for retail media, right? But in today’s episode, I make the case that this 'ad penalty' is temporary, and far from the end of sponsored products. We dig into why today’s AI models have inherited our...

Here’s a question that might sting a little: when your company launches a new product, are you finding out about it at the same time as everyone else? Or maybe you’re just getting a last-minute “Hey, can you build a forecast?” before it hits the market? In this episode, I dive into the role e-commerce and retail media teams should play in shaping product development, and why it matters more than e...

Imagine sending three different people to buy you a pair of slippers and each person comes back with wildly different products. Now replace those people with AI agents like Claude, GPT, and Gemini. What slippers would they choose? In this episode, I dive into groundbreaking new research from Columbia and Yale that reveals how AI agents shop when left to their own devices. The findings are eye-open...

In today’s episode, I dive into a surprising paradox in the retail media world. While nearly 9 out of 10 brands say a retailer’s tech stack influences how they allocate ad spend, most retailers are still treating their technology decisions like state secrets. From awkward RFP scenarios to brand-side frustrations, we explore why this secrecy exists and how it could be slowing the entire industry do...

I asked Amazon’s Rufus a simple question—and its answer was uncomfortably (and impressively) specific. In this episode, I unpack why that moment matters: Rufus appears to be building persistent memories about who we are as shoppers, shifting from a mere search tool into something that feels like a relationship.   I break down how this differs from legacy “people who bought X also bought Y” persona...

In retail media, the biggest wins often come from bold, high-stakes decisions. In this episode, I sit down with a panel of industry leaders who share the risks they took that could have gone either way. From betting on unproven product colors, to pulling the plug on ads during peak hours, these stories will inspire you to rethink what it means to take a chance in retail media. If you’ve ever wonde...

The retail media landscape is booming. But it’s also messy, fragmented, and heavily dominated by just a few players. In this episode, I unpack the challenges that brands face when navigating hundreds of retail media networks and explore whether alliances and federations might hold the key to leveling the playing field. From eerie parallels with the early days of digital advertising to emerging fed...

The world of advertising is changing faster than many expected and AI is leading the charge. In this episode, I dive into the rise of advertising inside large language models (LLMs) and explore whether eMarketer’s $25 billion projection for AI-driven search ads in the next five years is really as far-fetched as some think. From Microsoft’s early experiments with sponsored links in Bing Chat, to Am...

Did you know that while 70% of shoppers have experimented with AI tools to help them shop, fewer than 15% have actually used a retailer’s AI shopping assistant? In this episode, I unpack fresh shopper research from Acosta Group that reveals which retail AI tools are getting traction (and which are still invisible to most consumers). We’ll dive into surprising adoption numbers for tools like Amazon...

Remember the Amazon FBA boom? When all you needed was an Alibaba find, a seller account and a dream? Between 2012 and 2020, thousands of entrepreneurs built entire businesses inside Amazon’s walls. And for a while, it was a gold rush. But like all gold rushes, the music eventually stopped. Costs went up, competition flooded in, and only a select few brands broke free. Today, we’re standing at the...

When your own tech partners start publicly celebrating your struggles, you know the game has changed. In this episode, I unpack the fascinating shake-up happening in retail media, sparked by Criteo’s recent challenges — from high-profile client losses to a wave of nimble competitors seizing their moment.  What’s even more intriguing? Many of these challengers once relied on Criteo’s own infrastruc...

Let’s be real: retail media is full of shiny, headline-grabbing metrics that come and go with the latest trends. But in today, I’m digging into the metrics that brand leaders swear by day in and day out AKA the workhorses that drive real business decisions. I asked three brand-side leaders to share that one metric they come back to time and again, even when the industry is distracted by the 'next...

In part two of my conversation with Scott Wingo, we dive deeper into how AI-powered agentic shopping could reshape - and potentially upend - the current retail media landscape. We explore what happens when AI becomes the primary interface for shopping leaving behind the traditional retailer website. Who stands to lose the most? Who has a shot at staying relevant? We also question whether retail me...

When I launched my Amazon agency Bobsled back in 2015, I heard plenty of dismissals: CEOs calling Amazon ads a fad, and prestige brands scoffing at their products sharing carts with toilet paper. Fast forward to today, and I’m seeing another inflection point, one that could rattle the very foundations of the $60 billion retail media ecosystem — agentic shopping. In this episode, I share a snippet...

Retail media may be the shiny new thing, but the true magic happens when it blends with the wisdom of traditional shopper marketing. In this episode I sat down with four powerhouse brand leaders to uncover the best conversations they've had with their shopper marketing teams and the strategic breakthroughs that followed. We dive into how scenario planning helped an emerging brand prep for viral su...

Today I’m tackling a big shift that’s got everyone buzzing in the world of retail media. The IAB has just redefined the landscape, moving us from “retail media” to the broader, bolder umbrella of “commerce media.” What does this really mean? Is it just a new name — or are there real implications for brands, budgets, and how we measure success? In this episode, I break down the new IAB definition,...

Amazon just dropped its Q2 2025 earnings—and the numbers sparked plenty of hot takes across the retail world. In this episode I distill the smartest analyst commentary into three can’t‑miss story lines: the unstoppable growth of Amazon Ads, the surprising resilience of its core retail engine, and how the company’s AI push might reshape shopping (for better or for noisier). Stick around to hear why...

In this quick breakdown of my latest Forbes piece, I walk you through Walmart’s new four-part agentic AI roadmap—Sparky for shoppers, Marty for suppliers/advertisers, an Associate agent for store teams, and a Developer agent for internal builders. The headline? Walmart executives say Sparky’s multimodal interface will eventually make the classic search bar feel as ancient as the old Yahoo! directo...

every new retailer needs its own game plan—copy‑pasting your Amazon playbook is a budget trap. In just ten minutes, three seasoned ecommerce leaders—Justin Bomberowitz, Director of E‑Commerce at WILDE Brands; Nemanja Lazić, MBA, E‑commerce Channel Manager at Zevia; and Simon Swan, Director of Digital Marketing & Media at Karo Healthcare—share the hard‑won tactics that spared their budgets and...

Display advertising in retail media is still in the dark ages. That’s because the tech and mechanisms it was built on were never designed for retailers in the first place. In today’s ten-minute Retail Media Breakfast Club, I walk you through the real-world headache Macy’s faced when fragrance demand outstripped inventory while apparel inventory sat idle—and why fixed-price CPMs offered no way out....

Welcome Back to Season 2! I'm kicking off Season 2 with a personal update and a few exciting announcements about what’s ahead for the Retail Media Breakfast Club. After an unexpected twist involving a Green Card win, a year of digital nomad life, and a less-than-glamorous welcome back to the States, I’m finally settled and ready to dive back into the world of retail media. But before we return to...