Kroger’s New Retail Media Tool Expands Beyond Just ‘Click Counting’

Kroger Enhances Retail Media Measurement with New Incrementality Tool

The Challenge: Proving Retail Media Effectiveness

Retail media networks—especially in grocery—often struggle to prove their impact beyond basic metrics like clicks and impressions. Brands investing in retail media want clearer insights into whether their ads are actually driving incremental sales rather than capturing purchases that would have happened anyway.

Kroger’s Solution: A Smarter Measurement Tool

Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM), in collaboration with The Trade Desk, has launched a new incremental sales measurement tool to solve this issue. The key innovation? It goes beyond “click counting” and considers organic sales—those that would have happened regardless of ad influence.

How It Works:

• Uses control groups to compare shoppers exposed to ads vs. those who weren’t
• Ensures both groups have identical purchase behaviors, except for media exposure
• Measures the true difference in sales to reveal actual ad effectiveness

Why It Matters:

• Gives CPG brands a clearer ROI picture on their ad spend
• Helps justify investment in retail media networks
• Supports Kroger’s expansion into more advanced ad tech

What’s Next?

Kroger plans to extend this incrementality measurement across other demand-side platforms (DSPs), making the tool available across its entire advertising network.

This move underscores a growing industry shift toward more precise and accountable retail media measurement, as grocery retailers compete for brand marketing dollars.