• by Sara Guaglione , August 3, 2020

Meredith Corp. is teaming with Kroger to offer CPG brand advertisers the ability to tap into the grocery retailer to access Meredith’s inventory, target in-market consumers and directly measure sales impact with data from both companies.

“We are changing the buying model in the marketplace,” MaryRay Lombardo, Meredith’s vice president of digital sales, told Publishers Daily. “This is the first time a publisher in retail media is serving CPGs with shoppable premium inventory and first party data.”

Through this partnership, which launches today, CPG advertisers will have the opportunity to work with sales teams at Kroger Co.’s media advertising business, Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM), as well as Meredith’s sales team.

Kroger’s sales team can sell Meredith inventory and data directly to CPG advertisers. Kroger and Meredith sales teams can sell to CPGs together, as well.

Meredith will offer brand advertisers access to Kroger’s first-party purchase data and audience segments for media campaigns across its portfolio of 40 food and lifestyle brands, including Allrecipes, Real Simple, EatingWell, People, Better Homes & Gardens and Southern Living. 

For the first time, brand advertisers on Meredith properties will be able to apply "closed-loop" sales data from Kroger to their campaigns.

For example, a CPG company launching a new cereal brand would typically work directly with a retailer like Kroger. Now, they can also tap into Meredith’s inventory to target and reach consumers in contextually relevant environments, Lombardo said, bringing together Meredith's “rich, endemic food and lifestyle content” with Kroger's “meaningful purchase household data."

CPGs can measure campaign interactions from Meredith’s properties and tie it back to Kroger's online and in-store purchases. Kroger is the largest grocery retailer in the U.S.

“The holy grail for advertisers right now is to understand the true sales impact on their advertising,” Lombardo said. “There is a huge need for trusted environments and accountability.”

With this integration, participating CPG brands will have access to shoppable display ad units that allow customers to add items to their shopping carts and click-to-purchase directly to Kroger.

With “more people eating at home” compared to pre-pandemic times, people are grocery shopping and meal planning "more than before,” she said.

Meredith and Kroger will also co-produce consumer insights studies throughout the year.

“We are starting here in food and CPGs, but we think there will be a lot of learnings,” Lombardo noted, adding there is an opportunity to expand into other ad categories going forward.