Retail Media

Massmart Turns Its Digital Shelves Into Ad Inventory with Criteo

One of Africa's largest consumer goods retailers is stepping into the fastest-growing corner of digital advertising. Massmart, the Walmart-owned group behind Makro, Game and Builders, has announced a retail media collaboration with commerce intelligence platform Criteo (NASDAQ: CRTO) that opens its South African digital properties to brand advertisers and marketplace sellers.

The collaboration brings Sponsored Product Ads and Onsite Display Ads to Massmart's digital estate, giving advertisers data-driven formats positioned along the purchase journey. Because the placements are natively integrated into the shopping experience rather than bolted on, the retailer is positioning them as an enhancement to the customer experience rather than a tax on it.

A Walmart-Backed Retailer Enters the Retail Media Race

Massmart, a subsidiary of Walmart, is home to some of Africa's most recognised retail brands and operates a mix of retail and wholesale formats across several sub-Saharan countries, with leading market shares in general merchandise, liquor, home improvement and wholesale food. Retail media is one of the fastest-growing advertising disciplines globally, and the move creates a new route for advertisers to reach South African shoppers at the moment decisions are actually made.

What the collaboration puts on the table:

• Sponsored Product Ads designed to drive sales with strong return on ad spend and transparent analytics.
• Onsite Display Ads that lift brand visibility and product exposure at key points of sale.
• Commerce Yield, Criteo's retail media platform, giving Massmart's advertisers a unified way to manage campaigns across the retailer's website and app.
• Access for both established brand advertisers and third-party marketplace sellers.

Retail media is an important part of our growth strategy. — Aidan Johnson, Vice President of Alternative Revenue, Massmart

Johnson framed the opportunity in commercial terms: brand advertisers and marketplace sellers get meaningful ways to engage directly with a broad customer base at Massmart's digital points of sale. Working with Criteo, he said, gives the retailer proven technology and global expertise to deliver onsite advertising that is valuable for sellers and relevant for shoppers at the same time.

Why the Middle East and Africa Are the Next Growth Frontier

For Criteo, the deal extends a retail media footprint into a region it sees accelerating. The company's pitch to retailers rests on precise audience targeting across the purchase journey paired with closed-loop measurement — the accurate, transparent attribution that brands and their agency partners increasingly treat as table stakes before committing budget.

Retail media continues to grow globally, with particularly strong momentum in the Middle East and Africa. — Alex Crowe, Managing Director Retail Media EMEA, Criteo

The advertising solutions are already live on Makro.co.za, Massmart's flagship eCommerce and marketplace platform. Over the coming months, the two companies say they are exploring ways to expand and enhance retail media placements across Massmart's wider digital ecosystem, including Makro.

Why Marketers Should Pay Attention

Retail media budgets in South Africa have had few large-scale, measurable onsite destinations to flow into — and a Walmart-backed group with over 280 stores across 8 sub-Saharan countries suddenly opening sponsored and display inventory changes the planning maths for any FMCG or general merchandise brand selling into the region. The detail worth noting is the structural one: Massmart is licensing a vendor platform rather than building an ad stack in-house, which means advertisers get a familiar buying and measurement model from day one instead of waiting years for a homegrown network to mature. For marketplace sellers on Makro, this is the first real lever to buy visibility against bigger brands on the same digital shelf — and early entrants typically pay the least for it.

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Background: Massmart

Massmart, powered by Walmart, comprises over 280 stores across 8 sub-Saharan countries. Through its widely recognised retail and wholesale formats — Builders, Game, Jumbo Cash & Carry, Makro, Walmart and Shield — the group has built leading shares in the general merchandise, liquor, home improvement and wholesale food markets.

Background: Criteo

Criteo (NASDAQ: CRTO) is a global commerce intelligence platform serving brands, agencies, retailers and publishers. It is built on proprietary commerce data drawn from more than $1 trillion in annual sales and two decades of AI innovation, and works with thousands of clients across global retail and digital commerce to sharpen decision-making and deliver more relevant shopper experiences.