This recap was written by our CEO,
Jennifer Silverberg
.
What a fantastic show?Shoptalk?Europe was – picking the brains of so many international brand leaders, and also getting some great "pod family" time with?The FMCG Guys?and?The CPG Guys! The conference focused on questions we're facing as an industry as we navigate rapid change.
The top themes we heard from the stage and 100’s of private conversations included:
- Retail Media: Is it simply “media” now, served by a retailer (per?Albertsons Companies?announcement of new non-endemic offerings), or is media itself the actual “retail” now (everything shoppable, everywhere shoppable, all the time shoppable)?
- Omnichannel Experience:?Soraya Zoueihed Benchikh,?Diageo,?wrapped it up better than I could: "Our consumer is looking for a premium experience ... and for many of them, the first brand experience is online, and that experience is often something less than premium. There is a lot we can do about that if we partner with retailers."
- Responsibility as Competitive Advantage:?From marketing changes in response to UK HFSS rules, to sustainability, to data privacy, brands and retailers noted that “doing the right thing” isn’t just its own reward, but also can build consumer loyalty (particularly among the super-alert Gen Z) … and brands seem to be taking the lead.
- AI is Intriguing, but so far, mostly for Search: no panel was complete without an AI mention, but very few solid use cases were discussed.?Neel Arora,?Nestlé?showed a solid demo of how it might be used to support engaging, contextual search.
