In just a few days, I’ll take the stage at the Path to Purchase Institute’s Retail Media Summit Canada. We’ve recently attended retail media events in New York, Chicago, Minneapolis, St. Louis and San Francisco, and we hosted our summit in London (it's coming back this year!). But next week’s event in Toronto will mark our first time at an event in Canada — and I’m thrilled.
Spending on retail media in Canada is projected to surpass C$3 billion in 2024, nearly double the spend from just a few years ago, according to data from Insider Intelligence. That will only increase as more retailers launch Retail Media Networks that offer brands unparalleled opportunities to reach consumers using rich data.
What is retail media?
Retail media is in-store, online and off-site advertising for brands run by retailers. It helps retailers earn money by unlocking an additional revenue stream and creating smart marketing campaigns that elevate sales. It’s hot (but well-established) and overtaking traditional advertising formats, like linear TV. Above all else, it’s data-driven and allows brands to target shoppers using retailers’ robust first-party data.
That’s key as we enter this era of signal loss resulting from the continued deprecation of the cookie.
Retail media boosts revenue for retailers, grows sales and builds loyalty for brands and improves the shopper experience by enabling the personalization they crave.
We’ve been speaking with retailers in Canada, and we’re enticed by all of the possibilities. In the UK, where our parent company SMG is headquartered, our experts operate around 40% of the retail media market, so we know how big this opportunity is for Canadian retailers.
Retailers are great at selling produce, but there’s a learning curve to selling media.
That’s where Threefold comes in.
Luckily, our experts are ready and eager to put our 15 years of learnings to use and help Canadian retailers unlock that lucrative additional revenue by building, growing, supporting and supercharging robust RMNs. We know that there’s a lot of noise about retail media. We can make sense of it all
One way is through our Plan-Apps technology. Plan-Apps is the operating system for retail media – it streamlines insight-driven media planning, offers real-time performance data and enables post-campaign measurement, all while integrating with your existing tech stack. Plan-Apps powers all of our partner RMNs and offers efficiencies not available elsewhere on the market. It’s a game-changer for retail media.
Data from retailers who utilize Plan-Apps to operate their RMN shows that retail media is not a fad but a proven way to earn revenue as a retailer and maximize ROI for brands. Just take a look at our partnership with UK convenience retailer Co-op. Co-op earned C$14.8 million in annual ad revenue before our experts stepped in to operate Co-op Media Network. Last year, it brought in C$34 million in ad revenue. The numbers speak for themselves.
I look forward to sharing more on stage about activating data-driven, omnichannel retail media campaigns during the panel discussion titled “Redefining Retail Media for the Age of Omnicommerce” on February 6. I’m eager to join moderator Jessie Dowd from P2PI, Leanne Gibson from Walmart Connect Canada and Richard Rodgers from Keurig Dr. Pepper Canada – it’s going to be an insightful discussion.
There’s still time to connect with me and the Threefold team in Toronto at Retail Media Summit Canada. Send me a message at sean.crawford@threefold.team, and let’s see how Threefold can supercharge your retail media strategy, no matter where you are in your journey.
About Sean Crawford
Sean Crawford is the Managing Director of Threefold and the driving force and face behind Threefold’s North American expansion, which began in 2023 and has already seen the agency sign its first major US client.
Sean was recently awarded the 40-under-40 award from the Path to Purchase Institute, which honors the next generation of leaders in omnichannel marketing. As a retail media thought leader, Sean has presented at numerous industry events in the UK and North America and has been published by the industry press, where he has been called on to share his decade-plus of experience as a retail media pioneer.
About Threefold
Founded in 2008, Threefold is the world's leading Retail Media Network (RMN) specialist, headquartered in both New York and London. As part of the SMG agency network, which employs over 250 retail media experts, Threefold's primary mission is to unlock incremental CPG budgets, curate media campaigns that supercharge sales and elevate its retail partners into top-tier omnichannel media owners, spanning in-store, off-site and online.
Threefold's services include consultancy, evaluation, and a white-label in-house solution that has seen the agency build, run and operate over 10 Retail Media Networks to date. In the UK, Threefold runs and operates Walgreens' Boots Media Group and Morrisons Media Group, and additional live partners include major retailers like Asda, The Co-op, Signet Group and The Very Group.
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