Intel and Texas media and marketing company Vericast are piloting an in-store retail media network to deliver product information to shoppers.

Vericast and Intel have designed, deployed and tested the programmatically enabled digital in-store retail media network powered by Vericast’s intelligent targeting technology and Intel’s edge software platforms to deliver contextually relevant advertising and product information.

The collaboration is part of a larger effort to modernise retail and tap into the digitisation of physical stores.

Vericast recently tested the network by piloting an advertising campaign for a globally recognised beverage company across 50 individually operated convenience stores in Dallas and New Orleans. The two-week test featured eight different advertisements deployed on in-store digital displays and beverage cooler screens. The purpose was to validate the technologies and system, capture data, and discover learnings in a real-world environment.

The campaign delivered an estimated 350,000 verified customer impressions; captured zero-party data, or data that a consumer intentionally shares with a brand; tracked sales by SKU; measured consumer sentiment; and more. About 85% of consumers who visited a custom landing page created for the pilot opted in to provide data.

The in-store network leverages Vericast’s privacy-centric contextual advertising offering to deliver relevant digital ads to consumers as they shop and measures their behaviour with proprietary campaign data analytics. The hardware consists of multiple-sized display and cooler screen panels that transformed traditional surfaces into digital smart screens. These surfaces use IoT sensors and computer vision technology to capture anonymised analytics and enable Vericast to measure consumer engagement in real time.

“The digitisation of in-store signage and its use in programmatic advertising is a natural extension of Vericast’s commitment to relevant, responsible and measurable omnichannel impact,” said Hans Fischmann, vice president at Vericast. “Vericast provides the technology and know-how to engage with any consumer at any point on the path to purchase, whether online, on-the-go or in-store, all while adhering to and respecting consumer privacy demands.”

Recent figures estimate that retail media has grown into a nearly $40bn market reaching primarily digital audiences. Yet in-store audiences are even larger. Among 13 leading brick-and-mortar retailers in the USA, 11 had bigger in-store audiences than online, with the average store audience being 70% larger, according to Placer.ai and Comscore Media Metrix Multi-Platform data.

Vericast has recently expanded its in-store retail media network with multiple regional grocery chains, fast casual restaurants and a 1700-store commitment from a global convenience store brand.