Welcome to a midweek edition of Unmade. Our full publishing schedule resumes next week.

Today: We tell you our plans for our RE:Made event, and more ASX drama for The Market Herald

Below, we’re excited to share the second tranche of speakers for Unmade’s first conference RE:Made - Retail Media Unmade. While the earlybird discount runs until the end of next week, Unmade’s paying members save even more. Join today.

Adding PepsiCo, Cartology and Coles to the RE:Made lineup

The curator of RE:Made, Cat McGinn writes:

With just five weeks to go, we’re getting closer to finalising the conference content for RE:Made.

Curating a new event is always a little nerve-wracking, especially covering an emerging space; even more so when it’s not just Unmade’s first big event, but the retail media industry’s first conference in Australia. We owe it to this new community to get it right.

That’s of course why we have an advisory panel, and why I’ve spent so many hours hearing perspectives from so many of the industry’s luminaries.

Today, we’re excited to share the news that the bosses of the two biggest retail players in the space - Woolworths’ Cartology and Coles 360 - are among those joining us.

You will have seen last week’s announcement that the UK-based Colin Lewis, one of the world’s retail media experts, will be delivering the keynote.

The next session I can announce features Mike Tyquin, managing director of arguably Australia’s best-established retail media network, Cartology, and Vandita Pandey, CMO ANZ, PepsiCo. The pair will discuss the evolution of retail media, the customer experience, industry learnings and structuring for success, along with lessons of how PepsiCo is thinking about the fast changing space.

This session will offer an explanation of the changing customer behaviour that led to the inception of the Cartology business within Woolworths, including the sharing of shopper data collected in-store and online.   

Vandita came to Australia from the US in 2020, as PepsiCo ANZ’s first group CMO, and her experience spans brand, digital, media, product development and consumer insight. She has been at the FMCG giant for 13 years in marketing roles including Shopper/DX, media and brand.  She began her career in the finance sector with roles in investment banking and equity research.

Mike was appointed MD of Cartology in 2019, a division set up to draw on the successes of the overseas retail media offerings like Walmart and Amazon. Before that he ran some of Australia’s biggest outdoor businesses including EYE and Adshel. 

Another speaker we can announce today is Dan Robins, PWC’s retail media leader.

Last year’s edition of the PWC Media & Entertainment Outlook Report, edited by Dan, dedicated a chapter to the growth of retail media and fired the starting pistol on its explosive move into the mainstream of media thinking locally.

Dan will be sharing his expertise in governance, accountability and the valuation of the retail media opportunity. Over the last three years, Dan has worked with some of Australia's biggest retailers to explore the opportunity potential in their media assets, developing business cases and strategies for growth. He is as well placed as anyone in Australia to predict the sector’s development from here.

Also joining on our lineup is Teresa Aprile, cofounder and CEO of omnichannel retail media tech platform Brandcrush. Teresa will offer insights in how to build and scale owned media, and simplifying the process for retailers and brands. 

We’ll be announcing more excellent speakers in the coming days, including the role of Coles 360’s Paul Brooks.

As I said in my previous update, one of the exciting things about curating a retail media event is that there has been a real sentiment from participants that a rising tide will raise all boats.

That goes for our sponsors too. First time events aren’t usually commercially viable through ticket sales alone, so by putting their support behind RE:Made, our sponsors have made a wider contribution to the retail media industry.

I’m delighted to announce today that our Headline Sponsor is CitrusAd, while Cartology has come on board as Supporting Partner and Patient Zero is a Partner. Our thanks go to all of them. We’re also hoping to make further sponsor announcements in the coming days.

Our full program is almost complete. But there is still (just) time to share your thoughts on what we should be covering - please drop me a line at cat@unmade.media. 

The Unmade Index: TMH rises, then halts

Tim Burrowes writes:

There were more shenanigans on The Unmade Index yesterday.

Just four days after The Market Herald put out a strategy update to the ASX to say that it had reviewed its strategy and concluded it had the right strategy and should carry on with the strategy, the company put its shares into a trading halt “pending it releasing an announcement”.

Last year, TMH, owner of the Hot Copper ASX gossip forum, bought Gumtree, Carsguide and Autotrader from Adevinta. It has until the end of May to find the $60m plus interest it owes on the transaction.

TMH founder Jag Sanger was ousted from the company late last year in a board room coup.

Yesterday the Unmade Index of ASX listed media and marketing companies was flat, nudging upwards just 0.2% to 656.5 points.

The biggest faller was Seven West Media, which lost 3.3%, taking its market capitalisation back blow $700m.

The Market Herald was the biggest riser, intriguingly growing its share price by 5.26% before the trading halt was announced.

Time to let you go about your Tuesday.

We’ll be back with more soon

Tim Burrowes

Publisher - Unmade