On the way to Retail Media 3.0: Auchan – seven years pioneering the Romanian retail advertising industry

Retail media has entered 2025 with groundbreaking innovations and growth prospects far beyond what was expected in previous years. The digitization of advertising is accelerating and new channels like retail media are being adopted much faster. On the Romanian market, Auchan is an “early adopter”, even more precisely, the “initiator”, being the retailer that had the first coordinated retail media initiatives since 2017. Tiberiu Dănețiu, Board Member and Director Corporate Affairs & Retail Media was in charge with all this initiatives and is directly involved in the preparation, development and standardization of the Romanian retail media market, contributing to the consolidation of Auchan’s leadership in this innovative sector, which offers brands highly targeted, measurable and effective advertising solutions with direct impact on sales.

What is the main vision behind Auchan Retail’s retail media and omnichannel initiatives, and how does it align with the overall business strategy expectations?

Tiberiu Danetiu: We are a consumer-centric, omnichannel and multi-format company, and innovation is in our DNA since the beginning of Auchan Romania, when we first created the concept of generalized discount on the Romanian retail market. Auchan is also the first retailer to introduce RVMs for PET recovery in some of its stores in 2011, as a pioneer in recycling, the first used cooking oil collection program, the first self-checkout houses, the first fully autonomous store in Romania, and launched the first retail media center and many other innovations that we have achieved, many of them being a good source of inspiration for the entire retail sector. The retail media initiatives followed the same path, we investigated the topic since 2015, did the first relevant project in 2017, and launched the first retail media center in 2021, all ahead of the market.

The Romanian retail media market has started to grow in recent years, reflecting global trends. With the increasing digitalization of retail and the growing importance of primary data, retailers are leveraging their platforms to create new advertising opportunities for brands. Retail media offers a win-win framework for all parties involved: brands benefit from more targeted and effective ways to reach potential customers, retailers gain more loyal customers and generate additional advertising revenues, and consumers see more relevant ads and thus benefit from an enhanced shopping experience.

I firmly believe that the next steps are those towards standardization and integration of these communication and activation ecosystems by advertisers, brands and media agencies and the consolidation of retail media as an important and efficient vertical of the advertising industry, the retail media phenomenon being considered as the third major wave of advertising.

Our vision started with the first serious retail media initiative in 2017, when, for the first time in the Romanian market, we equipped a hypermarket with connected screens, ready to communicate advertising for brands. It was a pioneering activity through which we gained valuable experience, that allowed us to launch in 2021, also in a first for the Romanian market, the first genuine Retail Media Center, together with Retail Media Hub.

Subsequently, we have developed and evolved a complete and powerful Retail Media & Data Insights ecosystem, through which we support brands in their communication and relationship with our customers. This vision aligns with our overall business strategy through customer-centricity, as we enhance the shopping experience through personalized and relevant advertising content, focus on innovation and digitization by developing advanced media solutions, and strategically partner with brands by providing them with effective, measurable and impactful tools to maximize their visibility and results.

How does Auchan plan to differentiate its retail media offering in a highly competitive landscape?

Tiberiu Danetiu: Auchan Retail Media’s primary differentiator is our long-standing expertise, which we have built, developed and tested over the past years. We have created a 360 ecosystem of media, physical and digital channels in an omnichannel approach, through which brands can communicate with their target audience in a much more effective way, both in the short term for sales activation, but also in the long term for image building, as well as a series of data insights services related to buyers, sales, etc. Auchan Retail Media benefits both brands, because they can communicate much better, more relevant, directly to consumers along the shopper journey, consumers, who receive information of interest, relevant to their needs and for us as a retailer, because it helps us to better retain our customers.

Currently, we have over 200 companies to whom we offer our Auchan Retail Media and Data Insights services. These companies are part of various fields, such as FMCG, non-food, but also non-retail, as well as the automotive, pharma, telecommunications, etc.

Auchan Retail Media & Data Insights has revolutionized consumer communication, offering brands integrated campaign opportunities. We differentiate ourselves by providing together with our agency partner to marketers, agencies, and trademarketing specialists with a complete universe – a comprehensive understanding of buyer profiles, behaviors, preferences, and intentions, along with the most efficient media system for communication, data-driven insights for efficient media planning and targeted activation.

• Brands can benefit from integrated campaigns that include total or selective instore retail media through connected TV screens, with approximately 1,000 TV screens in 30 stores, instore radio, digital in-store displays, innovative solutions such as robots, digital promoters or conventional POSMs (gates, trolleys, in-store displays, etc.);
• They can access on-site digital advertising – search, sponsored products, banners and CRM (newsletters, sms, push notifications);
• They also have the possibility to opt for off-site promotion and extend the campaign outside the Auchan ecosystem on social networks.

Also, we provide brands with successful integrated communications with ROAS and ROI far superior to other media, and our Auchan Retail Media teams and our partner agency provide full support and training for data analysis, campaign creation and implementation, and results measurement.

The extraordinary benefits Auchan Retail Media offers to brands:

• Complete and integrated ecosystem: data insights + in-store, on-site, off-site advertising channels
• Increase brand visibility and promotion of products in a relevant shopping context
• Direct access to high-intent buyers
• Precise targeting with first-party data
• High ROAS (return on ad spend) and ROI and performance measurement indicators
• Cross-promotion opportunities and increasing shopping cart value
• Support, training and implementation for advertisers – brands or agencies

In what ways can brands leverage first-party data from Auchan’s platform to enhance customer segmentation and personalization?

Tiberiu Danetiu: Through the power of our data, brands benefit from increased sales and can make more effective investments in advertising or activations because it allows them to gain a much deeper understanding of their shoppers’ profiles, consumer behavior, and loyalty. This enables a more effective communication and stronger customer relationships. The wasted ad spend phenomenon is a current concern for advertising people, and Auchan Retail Media has the ability to bring performance to their communication, just by replacing a small part of these inefficiently used budgets with sensational results.

More than 50% of the daily sales in our stores are made through the loyalty card, which gives us the possibility to understand very well and very precisely what our customers want, and allows us to be much more useful to brands in their action to reach specifically, through GDPR compliant communication and activation, their shoppers in different segments.

Basically, we have access to a huge amount of anonymized, individual-level, primary purchase data that is aggregated and analyzed to reveal key insights into buying behaviors. Our Data Intelligence and AI capabilities enable us to predict these future behaviors, assess brand loyalty evolution, and measure the effectiveness of marketing activations.

What are the long-term key objectives that Auchan aims to achieve with the advanced advertising platform and retail media products?

Tiberiu Danetiu: We’ll continue to develop and expand our retail media and data insights network, directly and through partnerships, to remain the most advanced and efficient integrated retail media network in Romania. Our vision is to consolidate our leadership in the Romanian retail media landscape by driving innovation, maximizing efficiency, and achieving superior performance. We’ll enhance our AI capabilities and intensify our focus on personalization. Furthermore, we will leverage our group’s expertise to provide brands with the most effective marketing tools.

Our ongoing partnership development reflects our belief that any brand, regardless of industry, can benefit of the highly efficiency of Auchan Retail Media. Simultaneously, we are also reinforcing our commitment to sustainability, ensuring retail media encourages responsible consumer behavior.