Retail Media Is Revealing Something Bigger

I've written before that retail media's next chapter won't be defined by bigger networks or more sophisticated technology alone. It will be defined by how retailers and suppliers evolve the way they work together.

I left the Consumer Goods Forum Global Summit more convinced of that than ever. It wasn't our retail media panel that changed my thinking. It was the conversations throughout the summit about AI, forecasting, supply chains, commercial planning, and organizational change. On the surface, they were very different discussions, yet they all seemed to return to the same underlying questions.

It was in those conversations about retail media that everything began to connect. The deeper those discussions became, the clearer it was that retail media was simply the lens for something much broader.

I've come to believe retail media isn't simply another commercial capability. It's one of the clearest indicators of where retailer–supplier relationships are heading.

Looking Beyond the Capability

The discussion has moved beyond whether retail media matters. The focus is now on what it takes to make it successful.

Our latest analysis, combining Sevendots’ financial data with AGI’s supplier collaboration research across 21 major global retailers, found that the most collaborative organizations grew revenue by an average of 4.6%, while lower-performing peers declined by 1.2%, a 5.8% percentage-point gap.

The performance gap told only part of the story. Even more revealing was where the strongest organizations differentiated themselves. Retail media emerged as the largest capability gap between higher- and lower-performing retailers, alongside agility and data activation.

What connects these findings is that none of these capabilities succeed in isolation. They all depend on stronger alignment, shared decision-making, and deeper retailer-supplier collaboration.

To me, that’s the most important takeaway. Success isn’t determined by investment alone. It depends on the organizational capabilities and retailer-supplier partnerships that turn those investments into meaningful business results.

The Bigger Opportunity

Retail media will continue to evolve. Technology, measurement, and investment will all continue to advance. Those developments all matter.

But the bigger opportunity lies in what retail media is revealing about the future of retailer–supplier relationships.

That’s why I believe retail media has become such a valuable indicator. It doesn’t simply measure the effectiveness of a media network. It reveals the strength of the organizational capabilities, retailer-supplier relationships, and ways of working that will define commercial success.

For me, that's the broader lesson from the Consumer Goods Forum. Retail media isn't just changing how organizations invest. It's helping leaders better understand the capabilities they’ll need to build stronger partnerships, make better decisions together, and create value across the retailer-supplier relationship.

Those are themes we'll continue exploring through our Retail Media research and perspectives.