With surprising candor, Adam Smith admits his company has been lagging in the retail media race. “We’ve actually had a retail media function for about five years, but it’s had its ups and downs internally. What’s changed is momentum,” he explains. “We recognize that if we don’t step up, we risk falling behind.” 

Adam is its Head of Retail Media for Iceland Retail Media is the retail media network operated across the UK. by frozen food retail specialists  Iceland and The Food Warehouse,. The turbo boost set to propel Iceland to the front of the pack is a new partnership with global digital display leader STRATACACHE to provide digital signage, CMS and privacy-aware analytic sensor technology across 766 locations. 

“If we don’t step up now we risk falling behind, and right now the market is simply moving too fast to wait,” says Adam. The push is a strategic bid to tap the power of in-store measurement in order to take on dominant players like Tesco and Sainsbury’s. It offers brands granular data to optimize campaigns and create dynamic shopping experiences for Iceland customers. 

“In retail media, it’s not enough to simply run ads in-store, you have to prove impressions and conversions,” says Chris Riegel, STRATACACHE’s founder and CEO. “Our technology means that not only will the Iceland Retail Media Team be able to accurately report performance to their brand partners but that they will also be able to gain crucial in-store insights to help serve their advertisers and customers better.”

STRATACACHE’s in-store technology currently installed within select Iceland and Food Warehouse has already driven powerful results: The condiment brand, McCormick saw products featured on in-store digital screens receive a 10% boost in sales and a 17% increase in category share of transactions.

 

Data Insights in the Frozen Food Aisle

 

This collaboration makes Iceland and Food Warehouse the first European supermarkets to employ STRATACACHE’s Walkbase solution for precise audience attribution. The deployment of the camera-free sensor solution means that the Iceland Retail Media Network will be the most advanced in-store retail media network in the UK, able to accurately confirm real time in-store ad impressions without capturing shoppers’ individual biometric indicators, making it fully aligned to consumer privacy best practices. 

“By fusing sensor data with transactions we can tell brands, with much more confidence, who actually saw their ad and whether that exposure was linked to purchase. Beyond measurement, Walkbase gives us footfall patterns, shopper flow and dwell insights that help with layout, staffing and promotion planning. That data moves the network from guesswork to true performance marketing.”

Iceland’s integration of Walkbase’s sensor technology promises to enable brand campaigns based on actual footfall patterns, time of day, and regional shopper behavior while tracking real-time engagement and conversion with greater accuracy. 

Adam sees this robust in-store data measurement as the key to creating a richer, dynamic in-store experience for Iceland and Food Warehouse customers. “The screens must add value. We aim to inspire shoppers — recipe ideas, meal solutions, helpful promos — not shout at them,” Smith says. “Content must be timely and relevant to the location: a breakfast idea near morning traffic, meal inspiration near grocery aisles. Placement matters too — screens go where dwell time is natural, not where they interrupt flow. If a screen feels helpful, shoppers accept it; if it feels noisy, we’ll change it.”

Winning Over New Brands—and Old Partners

Adam acknowledges that, as its retail media offerings have languished over the past several years, valued brand partnerships have fallen by the wayside. Iceland Retail Media’s focus on in-store measurement capabilities is a bid to both win over new partners and win back those who have fallen away. “We want to open doors with brands that have stopped spending in retail, enable more precise campaign targeting, and prove the value of in-store media with real, measurable results. If we can bring back lapsed brand spend and show meaningful uplifts, that becomes a self-reinforcing cycle,” he says.

To that end, Iceland plans to combine precise measurement with flexible buying options—from individual store campaigns to national rollouts—to set itself apart from its competitors. And while innovating in the moment, it is keeping one eye focused on the future. Looking ahead, Iceland sees potential for evolving its STRATACACHE partnership as new sensor and analytic technologies emerge, “One of our team’s core principles is “Easy to buy – detail on demand.” We need to keep the onboarding simple, making it more attractive with clear packages, flexible buying options, collaborative planning sessions. Then to complement the ease of purchase, we need the data to be equally useable and easy to access through real-time dashboards, so brands can see impressions, dwell and sales uplift.”

Iceland may be a later entrant into the retail media race, but that timing may actually prove to be a key competitive advantage, allowing the company to leapfrog competitors with more advanced measurement capabilities from Day One. The UK. grocery sector’s retail media race is far from the finish line, but with its strategic investment in data-driven precision, Iceland is making a bold move to break away from the pack.