Titled ‘Rip the Script’, the campaign was devised by creative agency Wieden+Kennedy and Somesuch’s Dan Streit.

It opens on a film set and showcases the chaos of a Hollywood-style movie studio. Audiences can keep their eyes peeled for multiple celebrity cameos including Lisa, Eric Catona, Cristian Ronaldo, Kim Kardashian, Channing Tatum, Didier Drogba, Travis Scott and LeBron James.

Helena Thornton, VP, Nike brand management said: “We made this film to meet football communities exactly where they are, not just on a screen, but in their world and deeply ingrained into their subcultures. We didn’t want to follow the traditional marketing playbook.

“We wanted to give them something worth talking about, worth clipping, worth wearing, worth showing up to. A story they don’t just watch – one they can make their own. That’s the whole idea behind our universe of Nike Football.”

Enrico Balleri, VP, creative director, global brand voice at Nike added: “We were intentional in choosing every cast member in the film, and we had fun and leaned into the playfulness of their roles,”

“We knew Kim Kardashian, for example, takes Saint to play football, so we created a whole ‘soccer mom’ persona for her, and in later extensions of the film, we’ll build and deepen that storyline. A cast that reflected an authenticity and a real connection to football was crucial to us.”

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According to the sportswear retailer the collaboration will combine Trapstar’s heritage with Footasylum’s  operational expertise, retail platform and marketing innovation.

The partnership will see the retailer roll out the streetwear brand’s products in selected stores and online. According to Footaslyum, the collaboration reinforces its “position at the intersection of streetwear, youth culture and sport”.

CEO and co-founder of Trapstar Mikey Aryee said: “This is the right partnership at the right time. Hannah and the Footasylum team understand what we’re building.

“We’re focused on growing our product range, scaling our footwear collection which launched this year, and using Footasylum’s retail network to get it in front of the right people.”

CEO of Footasylum Hannah Mercer said: “Trapstar is one of the most iconic names to have come out of British streetwear. For more than two decades it has shaped culture, built a distinctive identity and earned a loyal following that extends far beyond the UK.

“It sits at the heart of fashion, music and culture, and its relevance to the consumers we serve made it a natural fit for Footasylum.

This comes as Footasylum expands into the DACH and Gulf regions. The retailer has also recently secured more funding from HSBC to increase its warehouse capacity and open more stores.

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Titled ‘Quality Around the Corner’, the marketing drive was directed by creative agency BBH London and directed by Tim Bullock through Rogue Films.

The spot spotlights a variety of products from around the world including Tesco Finest Mesquite, Beech & Oak Wood Smoked Salmon Beech & Oak Wood Smoked Salmon from the Shetland Islands; Tesco Finest Cave Aged Goats Cheese from the West Country and Tesco Finest 20 Month Matured Parma Ham from the Emilia Romagna region of Italy.

Felipe Serradourada Guimaraes, chief creative officer at BBH London & Dublin, said, “The best answer to a brief is to deliver an insight in the most crafted and charming way. ‘Quality Around the Corner’ is just that.”

UK marketing director at Tesco Murray Bisschop added: “Quality matters to our customers, and this campaign brings to life the care, expertise and attention that goes into every product on our shelves.

“From the way we source our ingredients to the standards we hold across our Tesco Finest range, ‘Quality Around the Corner’ shows that exceptional food can be part of every shop at Tesco, whether customers are picking up a few essentials or creating something a little more special at home.”

It will run across video-on-demand, subscription video-on-demand, out-of-home, digital out-of-home, press, digital, radio, and social media.

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Since then, we have been cited in trade press, referenced at industry conferences, and held up as an example of what specialist retail can do when it stops thinking of itself merely as a place to buy things and starts thinking of itself as a high-value media environment.

The recent HOKA Mach 7 campaign delivered a 30 per cent increase in share of revenue, a 13.3 per cent lift in incremental units sold in activated stores, and product engagement nearly four times higher than the control group. Those numbers are real and we are proud of them.

But if I am being honest about what the past year has actually looked like from the inside, the story is more complicated, more demanding, and ultimately more instructive than any campaign result communicates on its own.

We Built the Network Whilst Rebuilding the Foundation

Launching a retail media network is not a marketing decision. It is an infrastructure decision. And we made it at the same moment we were undertaking a significant business and group-level digital transformation; a new customer experience platform and a data integrity programme that touched virtually every part of how we operate.

That combination created complexity that was, in retrospect, underrepresented in our change management planning. When you are simultaneously reengineering your CXP, cleaning and unifying your data estate, and launching a commercial media proposition to brand partners, you are not just running three workstreams in parallel. You are running them in interdependency.

We navigated that. And what is emerging on the other side of it is genuinely exciting. The capability we are building into the platform right now will unlock value in our retail media network that was simply not possible twelve months ago.

The commercial opportunity ahead of us is significantly larger than what we have already demonstrated. But I want to be direct: getting here required investment, tolerance for complexity, and organisational patience that should not be underestimated by any retailer considering this path.

The Change Management No One Talks About

The technology is the visible part of a retail media network, and we’ve got great partners in Zitcha to support us there. The organisational change is not visible, but it is where the real work happens, and where the real risk lives.

Building our network required us to transform how marketing, data, measurement, retail operations, merchandising, and trade teams work together. These are functions that have operated – successfully, I should say – with a degree of structural separation for years. We have people in this business who carry institutional knowledge that no system can replicate. The challenge was not to replace that knowledge. It was to connect it.

That meant upskilling teams across the organisation, not just in technical capability, but in a new way of thinking. We needed people to become genuinely curious about data they had not previously had access to, to be comfortable with faster feedback loops, and to trust cross-functional conversations that previously would not have happened. We had to break down silos that were not broken through lack of intelligence or effort, but through decades of structural separation that simply had not needed to change until now.

That cultural shift is ongoing. It is not something you solve in a quarter. But the progress is visible. The quality of our campaign planning, how quickly we can respond to performance signals, and the conversations we are now able to have with brand partners about what the data is actually telling us are all reflections of this progress.

Marketing Integrity Is Not Optional

One of the less comfortable truths about launching a retail media network is that it forces you to hold a mirror up to your own marketing accountability. When you are selling media to brand partners based on the quality of your data, your attribution, and your ability to demonstrate incrementality, you have to be able to meet that same standard yourself.

Our level of sophistication from a marketing integrity perspective had to increase materially over this past year. We invested heavily in our omnichannel data capability, in media attribution frameworks, and in understanding the richness of the signals available to us across our customer estate. That work made us significantly better at understanding the true value of our own marketing investment, not just the investment our partners make through the network.

That accountability is now a genuine competitive strength. Brands like HOKA, Asics, Montane, and Nike are not partnering with us because we can offer them screens. They are partnering with us because we can offer them proof. Proof of incrementality. Proof of audience quality. Proof of commercial outcomes. The integrity of that proof starts with how seriously we take our own data.

What the Next Chapter Requires

One of the less obvious shifts of this past year has been in how we think about the role of our buying function. Historically, a buyer’s accountability ended at the purchase order – select the right product, negotiate the right terms, get it onto the floor. That discipline remains essential. But in a retail media environment it is no longer sufficient. Our buyers now own the full product lifecycle from purchasing through to the end customer.

That means understanding how retail media investment can accelerate rate of sale and reduce markdown risk, and it means sitting with brand partners not just to negotiate ranging and margin, but to co-design go-to-market activation that genuinely connects product to consumer.

The buyers who have leaned into this are becoming some of the most commercially rounded operators in our business — because they are now offering brand partners something more valuable than a range decision: a route to the customer, with data behind it.

That commercial evolution only works, however, when every go-to-market tactic is pulling in the same direction. The campaign that moved the needle for HOKA was not built on a single channel. It worked because in-store digital screens, onsite placements, CRM, and paid media were designed as a unified system rather than a collection of independent activations.

That level of integration requires planning disciplines and briefing processes that align marketing, digital, retail, and trade around a single view of the customer journey from the outset. When it works, the effect is compounding – each tactic amplifies the others, and the whole becomes significantly more powerful than the sum of its parts.

Underpinning all of it is a commitment to keeping the customer at the centre of every decision we make. In specialist retail, customer trust is the most valuable asset we hold – and it is also the thing that makes our retail media proposition worth something to brand partners in the first place.

What we are building with brands like HOKA, Asics, Montane and Nike is not an advertising arrangement. It is a storytelling partnership.

Their product expertise, combined with our customer knowledge and the depth of our service environments, creates something neither party could deliver alone: a rich, relevant and genuinely useful experience for the customer at the exact moment it matters most.

A customer mid-gait-analysis, or deep in conversation about expedition layering, is not a passive audience. They are at the most consequential point in their purchase decision. Connecting them with the right brand story at that moment is what this network was always built to do.

I am looking forward to an honest conversation at Shoptalk, not just about where we’re going, but where we’ve been.

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The body released a new report titled The State of AI in Advertising: Charting the Shift from Automation to Autonomy which looks at how generative and agentic AI are reshaping the sector.

It found that 58 per cent of its members are experimenting with AI within their organisations and a further 16 per cent reported that they are “scaling agentic systems” or using  “agent-first” marketing procedures.

The study highlighted that 63 per cent of IAB members are expecting AI to have a “transformative impact” on creative growth over the next 12 months.

Todd Parsons, chief product officer at Criteo said: “”There’s still a whole lot of room for advertisers to help consumers through AI… whether that’s to find products more effectively or discover new brands that might not have been found otherwise with search.

“There are opportunities to influence the way that models interact with us as consumers and guide us through discovery”

Around third thirds of advertisers have implemented changes to their metadata, content strategies and content strategies due to the rise of generative engine optimisation.

According to the IAB’s research, 74  per cent of respondents believed AI summaries are reducing traffic to brand websites.

However, only 4 per cent of members believed that they were “agent-first”, with many citing concerns around governance, data security, accountability and transparency.

Trust is a major issue with 47 per cent of advertising reporting they do trust AI agents in advertising due to a lack of transparency. This figure rises to 67 per cent among IAB members.

James Chandler, CSO, IAB UK, said: “The industry is entering a new phase of AI adoption where the conversation is no longer simply about efficiency gains or workflow automation.

“We are now seeing the emergence of agentic systems that can actively participate in media planning, optimisation, creative adaptation and commerce. The opportunity is significant, but the industry also needs to solve for transparency, accountability and interoperability if AI is to scale sustainably.”

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Titled ‘Designed for Me, Designed for Real Life’, the campaign is rooted in the belief that confidence is something you “build and stand up for”. It was designed as a response to real pressures women face.

Research from the brand reported that one in five British women over 30 have never felt confident. It also highlighted that only 7% of respondents stated they never feel fully confident in a swimsuit.

James said: “I know confidence can look so different depending on what stage of life you’re in, and for so many women, it’s something we’re constantly rebuilding. I’ve always believed that we deserve to feel comfortable, supported and confident in our own skin.

“That’s why this campaign with Pour Moi felt so natural to me. It’s about celebrating all women and real experiences, not perfection.”

Nicola Cosens, chief marketing officer at Pour Moi added: “Be unapologetically you. This campaign is to support anyone and everyone in realising that the real version of themselves is brilliant.

“Just as they are. That’s why we partnered with Ashley James. Ashley has spent years talking openly and honestly about body confidence, motherhood and what it means to feel good in your own skin. And that’s exactly why we love her. She stands up for what she believes, whilst showing up for herself and others, owning the narrative as opposed to letting others decide for her.

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As part of the app experience, customers can browse products and receive styling advise and recommendations.

Head of Digital Product at ASOS Melissa Lim explains that the retailer decided to implement an AI stylist feature on ChatGPT because it had found that consumers were increasingly using agentic platforms as part of their shopping journey.

She says: “For us, this is about being present where customers are already discovering fashion and making sure ASOS is part of that inspiration journey, rather than sitting on the side-lines.

“The ASOS Stylist app helps us show up in that moment of inspiration, reach new potential customers and drive discovery back to ASOS.com.”

According to Lim, the ASOS Stylist app in ChatGPT is part of its strategy to reduce friction in the shopping experience. It’s part of a plan to meet consumers where they are.

She adds: “It is also a natural extension of our role as The Stylist at ASOS: helping customers discover, combine and wear fashion with confidence.

“By bringing that styling support into new platforms, we can show up earlier in the inspiration journey and make it easier for customers to turn ideas into outfits and outfits into purchases.

Lim highlights that the stylist tool recommends products that are “genuinely” right for the consumer.

She says: “At ASOS, we see our role as helping people style themselves with confidence, not steering them towards products that serve a short-term commercial objective.

“The value of this experience lies in giving customers recommendations they can trust, because building that trust over time matters far more than any immediate gain. That principle was fundamental to how we designed the stylist.”

She explains that up until now, ChatGPT has primarily been a text-focused experience. However, fashion is a visual experience and can oftentimes be an emotional purchase. Movement, draping and fabric details all come into consideration when buying clothes.

She says: “Our experience is designed to be highly visual, bringing immersive product imagery and video, including livestream content, directly into the chat.

“We’ve applied learnings from years refining the e-commerce journey on ASOS to create familiar user interface (UI) patterns so shopping in ChatGPT feels more familiar. This shows in the way ASOS Stylist presents an edit or recommends similar items as alternatives.”

She highlights that the retailer’s Stylist app enables its customers to shop more “confidently” as it offers advice and guided conversation on how to shop for a particular body shape or style.

She says: “User research and A/B test insights from our product pages also show that videos provide more nuanced information about fit, so bringing this more prominently within the chat experience allows customers to better visualise how an item might look like on them.”

Lim adds that the retailer made the decision not to allow consumers to log in to their ASOS accounts through the ChatGPT for the initial release, so consumers are referred back to ASOS.

However, if customers have chosen to preserve its chat history within ChatGPT itself, the stylist will have access to previous conversations.

Lim says: “It’s still early days, but so far we have seen promising early engagement, with traffic from the ChatGPT channel increasing since launch, especially from new users.

“Once this new audience lands on ASOS, we see them actively browsing and saving products rather than leaving without any further interaction.”

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K-Beauty has become increasingly popular with UK consumers and PURESEOUL is the biggest K-Beauty retailer in the UK.

The brand has recently grown its offering and has launched MilkTouch’s liquid foundation. The foundation is the first liquid foundation from a K-Beauty brand available in the UK.

Retail Gazette sat down with PURESEOUL’s founder Gracie Tullio and its marketing strategy & communications manager Felicity Loftus to find out about how they have marketed the product.

Most people when they think of K-Beauty foundations think of cushion foundations, popularised on TikTok by Tirtir. But MilkTouch has brought a liquid version to the UK market.

Tullio explains that MilkTouch have been their partner since 2025 and are the first partner the Korean beauty brand has within Europe. She highlights that as they work with all their brands directly, it impacts the way they run their marketing campaigns.

She says: “The entire campaign, from start to finish, we’ve done in complete collaboration with the MilkTouch team in Korea.

“I think that kind of intensive localisation, personalisation and the relationships that we have with our brands kind of form the foundation of how we even begin to brainstorm a campaign like this. It’s very much about us and HQ.”

PURESEOUL had previously worked with MilkTouch to launch its cushion foundation. The foundation proved to be extremely popular with audiences and went virial on TikTok. A video of the foundation being passed around the firm’s office has over 2 million views on the social media platform.

She says: “I think Milk Touch as a brand is a good example of a brand that has put their faith in us as a local partner. The K-Beauty market looks very different in each country, and I think we really understand what it means to be a UK K-Beauty customer.

“We know what our community wants, and as a brand, they’ve really lent into that. With their previous cushion launch, we saw the results of that in a lot of the organic social media, but equally this time around, we now have got creators asking to be involved in it, and I can only anticipate that we’ll be seeing a lot  of organic social content for this specific foundation as well.”

Loftus added that its previous work with the brand on its foundation cushion led to the brand approaching PURESEOUL about the liquid foundation. And the campaign started from that very moment.

To come up with the right product for the UK market, MilkTouch and PURESEOUL reached out to creators to invite them to a testing day.

At the testing day, they were able to pick out their favourite formulas and give feedback on what they thought of the shade range, the tones and the coverage.

Tullio says of its creator network: “These are people that speak to brands every day, they’re a pin, they have seen more of the market, than we have. As beauty creators, their opinion is really, really important to us. It’s almost like they’re massive product testing feedback gurus.”

Loftus believes that the consumer base for the foundations “bridges the gap” between the generic beauty customer who wants to try out K-Beauty and the K-Beauty consumer.

She explains: “A cushion foundation might feel a bit out of their realm as they’re not really sure on that format. But this product gives consumers everything they may want from a K-Beauty foundation, as it has that glowy, glassy, dewy skin finish, but it also feels quite accessible to all beauty consumers in the UK as well. I think it’s a nice bridge between existing K- beauty customers and new K-Beauty customers.”

According to Loftus, this is just something the brand did for the UK, despite the fact the foundation is being launched globally.

Alongside creators, the retailer has utilised its loyalty scheme, Cloud Club, social media and its newsletters.

Loftus highlights that the Cloud Club was an important channel for the retailer and that its loyalty members had access to a pre-launch sale for the foundation. Members of its loyalty club were also invited to the launch event on June 2 with MilkTouch’s ambassador Twice member Jihyo.

Tullio explains that they approached the brand about having Jihyo at the event after finding out she was going to be in London for a concert.

She says: “So we really cheekily went and said, “Okay, she’s in London, and we’re launching this foundation, maybe can she do something?

“The imagery from the campaign is very Jihyo heavy. And the whole photo shoot was done in a blue theme for PURESEOUL, which is awesome.”

The retailer borrowed a Korean marketing technique to introduce the product to consumers, offering a free foundation brush with every purchase.  The brush is inspired by the viral makeup spatula trend from last year that had people applying their base make up with a spatula rather than a brush for a smoother, more flawless finish.

After the launch, it is important to keep up the storytelling, so most of the campaign content will come after the launch event.

Tullio says: “We really encourage organic content because we always want to be accessible to our customers. And it feels quite natural and organic, because that’s how we love and experience our products as well.

“We just want K-Beauty makeup to feel accessible and educational. It’s really crucial in terms of our strategy. No one wants to be sold to. If the product’s good enough, then people will like it, and that’ll do the job for you. I think our focus is on making sure we have good products itself, and then the rest just kind of happens naturally.”

Tullio highlighted that PURESEOUL will also look into adding promotional offers and free gifts after the initial launch.

She says: “We are really anti discounting, and we’d much rather give the customer something of value to kind of sway them if they need it, rather than just a flat promotion.”

Loftus highlights that the omnichannel experience is important to them as a brand as they aren’t a “super digital company”.

She explains: “It almost feels like an immersive experience when you’re experiencing one of our launches as a customer, because it really is across all those touch points.

“Take the journey of this foundation, they might have seen some of the content from last year, and then it’s resurfaced this year.  Or maybe they saw some content of their favourite influencers attending the testing event, and then it comes to launch. Or maybe they’re on our newsletter, or they’re part of our Cloud Club, so they get those comms, and then they go into store, and they can test and shade match.”

Tullio adds: “We want our customers to feel really involved in the product story.”

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Titled ‘More Than Toys’, the marketing drive aims to tackle the misconception that Argos is a destination just for toys.

Devised by advertising agency T&P, the creative is comprised of two executions in high traffic areas within London.

The installations turn two items from the retailer’s product range-a Habitat sofa and a fridge from Smeg into toys, complete with custom designed packaging and a 25+ age rating.

Laura Boothby, head of campaigns at Argos said, “We know Argos is often associated with toys, so we wanted to have some fun with that idea while challenging perceptions in a playful, unmistakable way.

“By reimagining standout home products as larger-than-life ‘toys’, these bold installations use humour and scale to draw people in – inviting shoppers to rediscover just how much more Argos has to offer.”

Matt Moreland and Chris Clarke, executive creative directors at T&P, added: “We loved this special build idea the moment we saw it. So bold. So fun. So WTF!?

“And we couldn’t be happier that it’s finally going live. Big up the brilliant Argos team who helped get this made (and IRL folks, this isn’t AI). And big up our brilliant Argos clients who believe stand out ideas.”

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Operating since the 1880’s in Sweden and Denmark, the firm now has farmer owners in seven European countries. Its brands include Arla Cravendale, Arla Skyr and Arla Protein.

The firm has seen significant success, with a revenue of €15.1 billion (£13 billion).

Sarah Oxley, lead shopper marketing senior specialist at Arla Foods explains how the firm’s retail marketing strategy has contributed to its success.

Arla Foods’ retail marketing strategy is focused around retail activations, according to Oxley.

She says “It’s a key part of how consumers experience our brands and ultimately nudges shoppers to conversion. It’s also an important way we build relationships with our retail partners.

“What’s changing is how far that can go beyond the shopping mission. We’re testing how retailer data and media can work harder at other parts of the consumer experience, making sure it’s cost effective as part of the wider marketing mix.”

However, the firm has been adapting its strategy and using more offsite activity to drive “consideration and reach new audiences”.

She says: “The pace of innovation in-store is exciting, we now have the opportunity to connect with consumers in a much more joined-up way when they’re actually in a shopping mindset, which is ultimately where it matters most.”

She adds that retail media allows the firm to be much more targeted. One example she gives is of a campaign Arla Foods recently ran which focused on increasing purchase frequency.

Oxley says: “There are also some interesting gamification mechanics emerging from retailers which we’re testing. It’s early, but it’s a good example of how engagement is evolving beyond just traditional formats.”

“There are different levels of data maturity across the market. Where we have access to strong first-party data, we absolutely lean into it. Where that isn’t available, we flex, using things like geography, store performance or category insights, as we always have. But there’s an opportunity for more consistency and depth of data across the market, which would help unlock more value.”

Creative is becoming a much bigger factor in helping brands stand out within a retail media environment, especially as stores become more “digitised”.

She says: “We see creative as the next “event horizon” for the retail environment. For us it’s about strong, clear messaging and pushing creative where we can, but also really understanding the retailer’s strategy and how we fit into that.

“The goal when activating in store is always helping to achieve our branded ambitions and support the retailer deliver their strategy.”

She adds that its marketing strategy has the biggest impact when brand comms, retail activity and promotional activity comes together.

Oxley says: “It should feel like one connected experience, just adapted to the moment they’re in. There’s still more to do as an industry to make retailer data easier to integrate to branded activity, particularly in terms of consistency and collaboration.”

She explains that measuring success of campaigns beyond sale metric is one of the biggest challenges marketers face.

Arla Foods works closely with its marketing teams and agency teams to try and get a better view of how retail market contributes to the brands success beyond just short-term sales.

However, there needs to be more consistency and rigour in the data and reporting coming from retail media networks as that’s a key part of highlighting key investment areas, according to Oxley.

The brand had learnt that retail media can be a very “versatile lever”. It drives short term sales, but also has a role in building the brand and strengthening Arla Foods relationship with retailers.

She says: “When you get the balance right – data, strategy, creative, execution – it can create campaigns that stand out and that people and our retailers notice, which is ultimately what we’re aiming for.”

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