Publicis Groupe’s Epsilon has hired Dave Peterson as general manager, global head of retail media, a new role at the company. 

Peterson is an e-commerce and retail media veteran. He spent 19 years at Target where he led the development of Target’s retail media business (now Roundel), one of the industry’s first and largest retail media networks. He retired from Target last year. 

Prior to Target, Peterson was the director of global sales with National Car Rental and held senior product management roles at U.S. Bank and United Health Group. 

Peterson is tasked with unifying Epsilon’s global retail media assets and teams. He’ll lead the effort globally to get client buy-in on the reorganized assets.  

Those assets include CitrusAd, which Publicis acquired two years ago. Last year it was integrated with Epsilon to create an enhanced retail media service that combines CitrusAd’s in-store capabilities with Epsilon’s off-site scalability (it has 300 million unique consumer IDs in its database). Branded CitrusAd, powered by Epsilon, the company says it is the industry’s first unified on-site and off-site retail media platform. 

Ric Elert, president and chief operating officer at Epsilon, said that Peterson is a “pioneering leader who has been an integral player in transforming retail media into the booming business it is today. His addition to the Epsilon family is another example of our commitment to helping retailers and brands win in this space, and we’re eager to chart the future of retail media with him at the helm.”  

According to GroupM research, retail media expenditures globally reached $100 billion in 2022.