Moderate but Sustained Growth
According to eMarketer's Retail Media Forecast Update H1 2025, retail media ad spend in the U.S. is expected to reach between USD 56 and 61 billion in 2025, with a moderate scenario of USD 58 billion. While year-over-year growth is slowing, retail media continues to gain share in overall digital ad spending and is projected to represent more than USD 1 of every USD 5 spent on digital media by 2029.
Dominance of Major Players
The retail media ecosystem is undergoing significant market concentration. Amazon remains the dominant player, capturing approximately 76% of all retail media investment in the U.S. in 2024, according to eMarketer. Walmart follows with nearly 8% market share, while the rest of the ecosystem is split among smaller networks that struggle to scale.
This landscape presents a clear challenge for retailers trying to compete without the infrastructure or scale of the giants. Market concentration may also limit the diversity of offerings for advertisers, who often end up investing in the same few players due to their delivery capabilities, reach, and proprietary data.
The recently blocked merger between Kroger and Albertsons—halted on antitrust grounds—reflects a worrying trend: mid-sized retailers are facing increasing structural barriers to grow and compete effectively in the media space. In this context, building a solid proprietary network with targeting, reporting, and performance capabilities on par with the leaders becomes essential to attract and retain ad investment.
Meanwhile, the landscape in Latin America shows a different dynamic. While Amazon remains the most widely recognized retail media player in the region, Mercado Libre has overtaken it in advertising spend, positioning itself as the local leader. Other players such as Cencosud Media, Rappi Ads, and Magazine Luiza are also gaining visibility and consideration among advertisers, according to eMarketer’s Latin America Marketing and Retail Media Trends Survey 2024.
This growth is largely driven by the perceived value of local relevance. In markets such as Chile, Brazil, and Mexico, brands tend to trust regional players more to connect with specific audiences, leverage contextual insights, and run campaigns tailored to local consumer behavior.
This scenario opens up opportunities for regional networks that, while not competing globally in scale, manage to position themselves as high-context value media. To stay competitive, these players must invest in technological capabilities, stronger measurement tools, and integrated advertising experiences that can attract budgets traditionally allocated to global giants.
From Vendor to Partner: A Structural Shift in Brand-Retailer Relationships
Beyond being a revenue channel, retail media is fundamentally reshaping the relationship between retailers and brands. It’s no longer just about selling ad space or leveraging consumer data—retailers are positioning themselves as strategic partners, playing an active role in campaign planning and execution. This shift fosters closer collaboration, shared insights, co-created strategies, and aligned business objectives.
As eMarketer notes, this new approach makes retail media a critical touchpoint for building joint value and pushes both brands and retailers to think beyond tactical advertising toward long-term, results-driven partnerships.
The Need for Restructuring and Better Measurement
As the initial hype around retail media begins to settle, organizational challenges are emerging that retailers must address to remain relevant as media platforms. According to eMarketer’s Future-Proofing Retail Media for the Next Chapter, many retailers are realizing that the real challenge isn’t launching a media network—it’s scaling it sustainably and profitably.
This demands internal restructuring on several fronts. On one hand, there’s a need for better integration between media, sales, tech, and data teams. Many Retail Media Networks (RMNs) still operate in silos, which limits strategic vision and seamless execution. On the other hand, lack of standardization in measurement and attribution is one of the main barriers cited by media buyers. Advertisers expect more unified, comparable, and actionable reporting to justify their investments.
To compete with platforms like Google or Meta, retailers must elevate their value proposition—not just in terms of data or audiences, but by offering more cohesive advertising experiences with clear metrics on return and efficiency.
From the Living Room to the Point of Sale: New Retail Media Frontiers
Retail media growth is expanding beyond traditional digital environments. On one hand, Connected TV (CTV) advertising is emerging as a new strategic front for RMNs. Thanks to its ability to combine massive reach with first-party data, retailers are beginning to offer integrated CTV solutions that allow precise audience targeting and impact measurement—something unimaginable in traditional TV models.
On the other hand, physical stores are re-emerging as key monetization spaces. With advances in digital signage, sensors, and interactive screens, the point of sale is becoming an extension of the media ecosystem. This evolution of the in-store environment enables the connection between awareness generation and conversion in the same location, offering brands strategic moments to influence purchase decisions.
The synergy between CTV and in-store reinforces the omnichannel vision of retail media and multiplies brand-consumer touchpoints by integrating physical and digital strategies under a unified, data-driven approach.
The Future of Retail Media Will Be Nonlinear
Retail media’s growth won’t follow a predictable or uniform trajectory. As eMarketer emphasizes, we’re entering a nonlinear phase, where expansion will happen on multiple fronts at once: new formats (CTV, in-store, shoppable content), new partnerships between retailers and tech platforms, and new demands around measurement and ROI. This complexity requires ecosystem players to develop more flexible and connected strategies, able to adapt to fragmented audiences and increasingly hybrid journeys. Understanding this nonlinear nature is key to designing sustainable and differentiated medium-term solutions.
Conclusion: Adapt to Thrive
Retail media has reached a point of maturity—it’s a consolidated category with clear structures, budgets, and expectations. But maturity doesn’t mean stability—it implies constant evolution. Market concentration, stronger measurement demands, and the expansion into new environments like CTV and physical stores are redefining the rules of the game.
For retailers, sustainable growth won’t just depend on having digital inventory—it will require becoming true media companies: with integrated teams, reliable metrics, strong tech partnerships, and consistent value propositions. For advertisers, the challenge lies in building deeper relationships with these environments, seeking scale, precision, and transparency.
The future of retail media will be defined in that balance—between technology, strategy, and collaboration.
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