PRN, Place Exchange Strike Deal For Programmatic Ads In Retail Screen Networks

January 18, 2024 by Dave Haynes

I could put up posts almost daily about partnership announcements involving programmatic adtech firms and network operators, but then I’d have to decode what the programatic people are going on and on about.

But once in a while one of these announcements is kind of interesting because of who is involved – in this case a company that was doing retail media networks long before that had a name, and a programmatic platform.

PRN has struck a deal to allow and work with ad placements run through the supply side programmatic operator Place Exchange – enabling  “PRN’s many retail clients to take advantage of mutually acceptable programmatic brand advertising incremental to PRN’s direct advertising sales services.”

PRN, owned for many years now by STRATACACHE, was doing in-store digital media all the way back to the late 1990s – hanging tube TVs from the ceilings of big box stores like Walmart and selling ads. Back then it was also known as Premier Retail Networks.

From PR about the partnership:

PRN pioneered rich, digital media in the physical shopper journey and has the largest in-store retail media networks in the U.S. Integration with Place Exchange allows PRN’s retail clients to access the largest programmatic pool of demand from advertisers looking to leverage in-store screens as part of their digital out-of-home (DOOH) and omnichannel campaigns. Given PRN’s vast experience in ensuring relevant shopper advertising and retailer brand safety, campaigns will be carefully and selectively curated.

2024 will be the year of in-store retail media. With in-store shopping accounting for 85 percent of total retail sales in the United States, according to Statista, digital screens in stores are poised to attract a growing share of the burgeoning retail media advertising spend. Furthermore, programmatic OOH spend is on the rise and attracting more retail-friendly brands and advertisers due to the programmatic buying benefits of ease, flexibility and automation. eMarketer’s Insider Intelligence projects programmatic OOH in the US will be a billion-dollar category by 2025.

PRN has secured billions of dollars in direct retail advertising sales for their retailer clients over the last 25 years. PRN will continue to focus on value-added direct advertising sales enabled by its decades of brand and agency relationships and will balance this with technology that incrementally adds the value of open and private exchange buying.

Place Exchange’s patented technology seamlessly enables planning, targeting, execution, and measurement of OOH media on par with other programmatic channels, all within the leading DSP platforms.

Chuck Billups, SVP Retail Media at PRN said, “We are excited to take our partnership with Place Exchange to the next level, having already subscribed to their PerView measurement solution. Place Exchange has focused on creating an exchange that is vast and network friendly with a best-in-class API that will allow us take advantage of new revenue streams and budgets while creating the best in-store retailer experiences and services for which we are trusted.”

Nick Bennett, SVP Partnerships at Place Exchange said, “We’re thrilled to offer additional revenue opportunities for PRN’s retail clients. In a moment when most sales are taking place in brick-and-mortar locations, buyers can now access highly desirable in-store inventory from PRN’s clients within the leading programmatic buying platforms they already use, and easily integrate them into their omni-channel strategies.”

Time travelling … here’s what PRN looked like in the late 1990s (very hard to find pix from the time before smartphones):