Beyond The Shelf

This episode is part of our BTS Live miniseries, featuring quick conversations recorded on the show floor at the WBR Commerce Media Brand Summit in Atlanta.

Dave speaks with Collin Colburn of the IAB about the next phase of retail media maturity.

As the space evolves beyond rapid growth, the focus is shifting toward omnichannel integration, improved measurement, and greater transparency.

Collin shares how brands are connecting retail media with channels like CTV and social, why incrementality remains a key priority, and how gaps in measurement transparency continue to hold the industry back.

He also highlights a growing opportunity around creative — as retail media expands beyond lower-funnel performance into full-funnel engagement.

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Producer: Jake Musiker

This episode is part of our BTS Live miniseries, featuring quick conversations recorded on the show floor at the WBR Commerce Media Brand Summit in Atlanta.

Dave speaks with Jack Kneuper of Perdue Farms about the evolving role of performance marketing in a fragmented, omnichannel landscape.

As the traditional funnel breaks down, brands must ensure every touchpoint — from CTV to retail media to in-store — is working together to drive results.

Jack shares how Perdue is prioritizing creative quality across channels, leaning into more authentic content to engage younger audiences, and using AI to automate reporting and improve operational efficiency. 

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Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

This episode is part of our BTS Live miniseries, featuring quick conversations recorded on the show floor at the Commerce Media Brand Summit in Atlanta.

Dave speaks with Skye Frontier of Incremental about the evolving role of measurement in retail media.

As budgets expand beyond shopper and trade into brand investment, brands are being held to a higher standard — shifting from ROAS to incrementality and focusing on true business impact.

Skye shares how brands are moving beyond last-touch attribution, embedding new measurement frameworks across workflows, and rethinking how retail media drives growth across the full portfolio.

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Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

This episode is part of our BTS Live miniseries, featuring quick conversations recorded on the show floor at the Commerce Media Brand Summit in Atlanta.

Dave speaks with Celia Van Wickel of Russell Stover about how brands are evolving their commerce media strategies — from expanding search across retailers to shifting KPIs beyond ROAS toward share of voice, new-to-brand, and incrementality.

She also shares how her team is scaling retail media and digital shelf content with limited resources, and how Russell Stover is partnering with It’sRapid to streamline creative production, adapt content across retailers, and drive more consistent performance across seasonal campaigns.

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Is your PDP ready for AI? Get Your Free PDP Readiness Audit

Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

This episode is part of our BTS Live miniseries, featuring quick conversations recorded on the show floor at the Commerce Media Brand Summit in Atlanta.

Dave speaks with Michele McNamara, Director of Digital Commerce & Omni Activation at Newell Brands, about how brands are thinking about measurement, incrementality, and mobile-first shopper behavior.

They also discuss Newell’s work with It’sRapid on mobile hero imagery, and how optimizing for mobile discoverability is helping drive stronger performance with retail partners, by making products easier to find and more relevant in the moment.

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Is your PDP ready for AI? Get Your Free PDP Readiness Audit

Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

This episode is part of our BTS Live miniseries, featuring quick conversations recorded on the show floor at the Commerce Media Brand Summit in Atlanta.

In this minisode, Dave speaks with Andrew Groom, Senior Director of Digital Marketing and Ecommerce at The Wine Group, about how AI is helping brands optimize audiences and creative, and how the company is partnering with It’sRapid to accelerate campaign development and ecommerce content iteration.

They also discuss innovation in ready-to-drink beverages, managing large product portfolios across retailers, and how digital campaigns are increasingly connecting with in-store moments.

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Is your PDP ready for AI? Get Your Free PDP Readiness Audit

Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

Dave sits down with Joe Lamberson, Director of Digital Initiatives & Partnerships at Acosta Group, to discuss how brands can modernize digital shelf execution and keep up with rapidly rising retailer expectations.

With Acosta supporting thousands of brands across retail and ecommerce, Joe has a unique perspective on the operational challenges brands face—from content creation and item setup to retailer scorecards and image requirements.

A major theme of the episode is the Acosta × It’sRapid partnership, and how automation is helping brands scale digital shelf content creation while maintaining quality and compliance.

They discuss:

• Why digital shelf content refresh has become an always-on process
• How AI is helping brands break the speed / quality / cost tradeoff in content creation
• The growing importance of mobile hero images and retailer scorecards
• How Acosta works with technology partners like It’sRapid to help brands scale content execution
• Why image creation, visual analytics, and automation are becoming essential capabilities
• What generative search and AI could mean for product discoverability

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Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

This week on Beyond the Shelf, Dave sits down with Stephen Shepherd, Head of Strategy & Consulting at Tesco Media, to explore how retail media has evolved from a tactical revenue stream into a strategic growth engine.

With nearly two decades in the space — beginning with Dunnhumby’s early retail media initiatives — Stephen brings a data-first perspective to how retailers and brands should think about customer experience, creative, and measurement.

In this episode, Dave and Stephen discuss:

• Why retail media must stay customer-first (not tech-first)
• The “win-win-win” model: retailer, brand, and customer
• How creative storytelling and data science overlap
• The importance of micro-decisions across the customer journey
• Where AI is quietly solving operational complexity
• Why ROAS may not be the right north star anymore

Connect with Stephen on LinkedIn

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Get the It’sRapid Creative Automation Playbook

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Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

Dave’s guest this week is Ben Narasin, Founder and General Partner of Tenacity Venture Capital. Ben is a venture capitalist and longtime entrepreneur who invests at the intersection of technology, commerce, and consumer behavior — with a career spent backing (and building) companies that shape how brands sell and operate in a digital-first world.

In this episode, Dave and Ben talk about how the VC lens on commerce has evolved, why “AI strategy” is quickly moving from curiosity to ROI scrutiny, and what founders and operators should do as the pace of change accelerates. Ben shares a pragmatic framework: empower teams to test, pilot, and measure quickly — because you can’t research your way into winning with emerging technology.

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Get the It’sRapid Creative Automation Playbook

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Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker

Dave’s guest this week is Chris Riedy, CRO at Ibotta, where he’s helping evolve promotions and offers into a true performance marketing engine for CPG brands.

In this episode, Chris breaks down why great sales is really about problem-solving, trust, and empathy - not transactions. He shares how Ibotta has evolved from a consumer app into a platform that connects manufacturers, retailers, and shoppers in moments that change behavior.

Dave and Chris also dig into what makes promotions incremental instead of subsidized, how creative and offers can travel across retail media and even into CTV, and why AI and machine learning are most powerful when they help marketers learn faster, not guess better.

Connect with Chris on LinkedIn

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Learn More about It'sRapid

Get the It’sRapid Creative Automation Playbook

Take It’sRapid’s Creative Workflow Automation with AI survey

Email us at [email protected] to find out how to get your free AI Image Audit

Theme music: "Happy" by Mixaud - https://mixaund.bandcamp.com

Producer: Jake Musiker