Innovating Retail

In our rapidly evolving retail media landscape, innovation is the key to success. At Sainsbury’s and Nectar360, we’ve committed ourselves to enhancing the shopping experience in the best ways we can. Our latest initiative, the rollout of digital screens as part of Sainsbury’s Live network, is a testament to this commitment. 

We now have over 550 external and internal full-motion digital screens across Sainsbury’s stores and are excited to look back and share our progress so far. 

This rollout hasn’t just been about installing the screens (although they are a big part of it) – it’s about continuing to revolutionise the retail media space creating dynamic, engaging and even more personalised shopping experiences. They won’t only display advertisements but  could include navigational content, directing customers to specific products in the store, further enhancing the customer’s shopping journey. 

Looking at the journey from our initial announcement to the upcoming milestone, I’ll be outlining the partnerships and innovative approaches that are helping to carry this great initiative forward.   

Back in October, we announced an extension to the Sainsbury’s Live network in which we would be rolling out over 800 internal & front of store digital screens nationally, in collaboration with the team at Clear Channel. Now, eleven months on, we are halfway through phase three of the initial plan and having reached over 550 full-motion digital screens, here’s a refresher of what we set out to do: 

• • Phase one – Partnership: By partnering with one of the UK’s leading Digital Out of Home media owners, we are optimising our potential to offer a fantastic digital proposition in our stores. Supporting each other on the operational and technical challenges to drive executional excellence and establishing a commercial model that benefits all parties will be pivotal to our success. 
  • Phase two – Plan & Trial: With the large number of stakeholders that need to be consulted and subsequent considerations to be assessed, it was vital to make sure we carefully crafted our plan to land digital screens in our stores. Key operational considerations included: type of screen; energy consumption; data connectivity; colleague impact; customer feedback and governance processes. 
  • Phase three – Scale: Following the successful trials, it is full steam ahead as we look to apply our learnings from the trial and rollout our internal screen throughout 2024/25, as well as upgrading and installing new screens at the front of stores. Achieving this at scale requires support from a large group of stakeholders and we are really looking forward to seeing the screens in the ground! 
  • Phase four – Future Developments/Alignment.      

Since setting out this plan, our teams have been working behind the scenes to ensure the strategic placement of our screens. As of seven months ago, we began the physical installation, marking the significant transition from planning to execution. The installation of our 550th full-motion digital screen symbolises our progress so far, as well as our commitment to continuing to enhance the in-store experience for Sainsbury’s customers.

One thing we always promised to do when we set out our initial plans was to make sure the screen network was fully functional before offering the opportunity to invest in the proposition. This was to ensure we could continue to deliver maximum value and performance from the outset. 

Now that phase three is well and truly underway, it’s time to look forward to phase four: future development. This phase is dedicated to maintaining Sainsbury’s position at the cutting edge of innovation in the retail media industry and ensuring we continue to develop our proposition.  

This is just the beginning of our journey and we are already planning for a future in which we could potentially offer further integrations with digital signage and look to offer a full 360 digital offering – onsite, offsite and in-store. 

Want to discover more about our Sainsbury’s Live network? https://www.thegrocer.co.uk/sainsburys/nectar-360-to-double-its-network-of-digital-screens-in-sainsburys-stores/683938.article