Wakefern, Kroger leverage media to bolster marketing muscle

This week, data-driven services company Inmar Intelligence said Wakefern is making a foray into off-site programmatic advertising by using the Inmar Retail Cloud to grow its retail media network. Meanwhile, multiplatform media company Meredith Corp. — known for such brands as Better Homes & Gardens and People — unveiled a partnership with Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM) to offer a new integrated media service that will help CPG brands make advertising “more shoppable.”

By expanding its use of the Retail Cloud, Wakefern aims to offer targetable and attributable off-site media at scale to spur shopper engagement for its brands, Inmar said. Plans call for the Keasbey, N.J.-based retail grocery cooperative to launch targeted campaigns via managed services or through a self-service user interface, while also being able to gauge the impact on sales.

“This marks Wakefern’s entry into programmatic retail media amplification to extend our reach to new consumers and drive engagement with our loyal customers,” according to Steve Henig, chief customer officer at Wakefern. “Expanding into Inmar Intelligence’s turnkey retail media solutions enables us to build a network for the future that will deliver an enhanced shopper experience that connects our brands to consumers in new and personalized ways.”

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The nation’s largest retail grocery co-op, Wakefern has 51 independent grocery retail members that own and operate 354 supermarkets under the ShopRite, Price Rite Marketplace, The Fresh Grocer, Dearborn Market, Gourmet Garage and Fairway Market banners in New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Rhode Island.

Winston-Salem, N.C.-based Inmar said its Retail Cloud enables brands to easily integrate promotions and media programs, including off-site and on-site media, digital incentives, influencer marketing, chat-based media and in-store marketing. The cloud is powered by ShopperSync, a data intelligence platform that allows retailers to leverage their anonymized transactional data across all media and promotions channels in their network, while managing permissions and governance rights.

Besides providing a more unified solution across media and promotions, a retail media network could generate a secondary revenue stream for retailers and drive incremental growth, Inmar noted.

“We are delighted that Wakefern has chosen to expand their relationship with Inmar Intelligence as they expand their retail media network to help scale the business for the future,” Inmar Chairman and CEO David Mounts said in a statement. “We are constantly focused on enabling retailers to provide a better shopping experience for consumers, while providing transparent, manageable monetization opportunities as well.”

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Through the Meredith-Kroger integrated service, CPG brands will have access to display ad units that enable shoppers to seamlessly add items to their shopping carts and click-to-purchase directly to Kroger.

New York-based Meredith said this week that the integrated service with KPM, Kroger’s media advertising unit, will give brand advertisers access to Kroger’s first-party purchase data and custom audience segments. That information will be used to power media campaigns across Meredith’s portfolio of 40-plus food and lifestyle brands, including Allrecipes, Real Simple, EatingWell, People, Better Homes & Gardens and Southern Living.

By matching premium content with sales data, Meredith and KPM can help marketers identify which shoppers are most relevant to their brands at any moment and influence product discovery, meal planning, product trial and shopping routines, according to Meredith. Participating CPG brands will have access to display ad units that enable shoppers to seamlessly add items to their shopping carts and click-to-purchase directly to Kroger.

“More than ever, consumers are hungry for inspiration and convenience. As America’s grocer, millions of customers each day already trust Kroger to help them put dinner on the table,” stated Cara Pratt, vice president of commercial and product strategy for KPM at 84.51°, Kroger’s data analytics subsidiary. “Now Meredith’s premium content and recipes will further help customers to discover products and seamlessly purchase online or in-store.”

Kroger will provide participating brands with custom reports that directly measure the impact of their premium, “shoppable” unit campaigns via online and in-store sales, driven by verified exposures, Meredith said. Via their collaboration, Meredith and Kroger also will co-produce consumer insight studies throughout the year to show how consumers “translate inspiration to purchase” within food and lifestyle media, Meredith added.

“This strategic alignment with Kroger speaks to the unmatched potential of bringing content, targeting and measurement together for CPG food partners. It makes our authoritative first-party food and lifestyle data set that much richer, granting CPG advertisers direct access to measure the impact of their campaigns on sales at the nation's largest grocer,” commented Alysia Borsa, chief data and marketing officer at Meredith. “As the predominant food and lifestyle publisher, and with Kroger’s integration, we’ll be able to target and deliver campaigns that move the needle for the world’s leading CPG brands.”