Kroger expands retail media arm into video, CTV

Dive Brief:

Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM), the retail media business of The Kroger Co., now includes video and CTV inventory after the expansion of its private programmatic marketplace, per information shared with Marketing Dive.
Through the expansion, advertisers using KPM will be able to access sale data in order to target relevant households with tools including Magnite, OpenX, PubMatic and Xandr to gain expanded audience intelligence.
The expansion follows a recent move by the retail media network to partner with Pacvue, which greatly expanded its programmatic abilities. As CTV and streaming video grow in popularity, KPM’s new offerings could provide advertisers with a competitive value proposition in an increasingly saturated retail media environment.

Dive Insight:

Kroger, America’s largest grocery retailer by revenue, is making plans to further expand its KPM business through CTV and video offerings, along with new programmatic abilities. With the expansion, advertisers will now be able to access audience intelligence through sales data, customize CTV and video inventory in a centralized marketplace and view campaign measurements including attributable retail sales and household penetration.

“Streaming is the number-one way people consume TV today,” said Cara Pratt, senior vice president of KPM in a statement. “That means the majority of TV viewing hours can now be optimized in the programmatic environment. Our retail data precisely reaches households — such as lapsed or infrequent brand buyers — and then matches advertising exposure to store sales to measure brand impact.”

KPM’s self-service private marketplace, which first launched in 2021, is largely built on Kroger’s popular shopper loyalty program, which links to 96% of sales. The grocery retailer further expanded its loyalty offerings with Boost, which is an annual membership program available across all of Kroger’s brands.

Despite Google once again pushing back the deprecation of third-party cookies, brands are still looking for innovative and effective ways to reach consumers. Retail media networks have proven to be a sought-after move and span multiple industries from ride share companies such as Lyft to Dollar General. With the addition of its video and CTV tools, Kroger is poised to connect advertisers, especially CPGs, with its wide array of consumer data and perhaps further bolster itself as the space grows tense with competition.