Retail Media Day of Learning

Albert Nance leads the West Coast account team at Clinch. With over 16 years of Account Management experience in the ad world, Albert has been a partner for the strategic advancement of brands, like Albertsons Media Collective, Microsoft, Gap, Truth Initiative, Miller Lite, and Oregon Lottery.  He’s spearheaded the growth and awareness of 50+ brands at local, national, and global levels. Launched hundreds of marketing campaigns and dozens of websites. He won the AAF National Student Advertising Competition in college and has remained close to it by judging multiple competitions since. He resides with his wife and daughter just outside of Portland, Oregon in a small town known for hiking, water sports, and adult beverages. He’s happy to chat about any of those topics.

Nikki Neary has 14 years of experience in the digital advertising industry, the last 10 years spent at Horizon. Nikki is currently an SVP, Digital Investment leading the digital strategy and investment for a variety of CPG brands, including Unilever’s Sundial Brands and Chobani. In 2018, Nikki was named a Cynopsis “Top Woman in Digital” for Directors Who Do It All. Nikki has worked across multiple retail and CPG accounts at Horizon on branding, retail/shopper, and direct response initiatives. Prior to her time at Horizon, Nikki was on the digital planning and activation team working across PepsiCo brands. Nikki graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology with a degree in Advertising and Marketing Communications.

As General Manager for Tapad, a part of Experian, Mark oversees Product and Marketing. Mark has more than two decades of experience in digital media and advertising. As the former SVP, Global Chief Mobile and Data Officer at AOL (a subsidiary of Verizon now known as Verizon Media Services), Mark was responsible for leading mobile advertising and data strategy, as well as enterprise-wide data commercialization. Mark has held several “C” level positions at both public and private marketing and advertising companies, and currently serves as an advisor or board member for several companies in the ad/martech space. An avid water lover, you can find Mark with his amazing wife, three kids, and dog Mozy, kicking back and enjoying the ocean waves in Mattapoisett, Massachusetts throughout the year.

Lester is currently the Managing Director of Retail and CPG Sales for Experian Marketing Services. Prior to this role, Lester was the VP of Sales for Retail and CPG at Experian Marketing Services. Lester joined Experian three years ago with over 20 years of experience in the digital media and adtech space including working for companies such as Triad Retail, Cars.com, ShopLocal, PointRoll, Comcast Spotlight and The Washington Post. He was part of the sales launch team when Cars.com launched its second market in Washington, D.C. and has since held various sales and business development leader roles at these companies. Lester holds a BA from Marquette University and currently serves on the IAB Retail Media Network Sub-Committee. 

Elizabeth has 13+ years of experience in media sales and digital advertising. As Group Director of Agency Partnerships, Elizabeth is responsible for the growth and development of Kroger Precision Marketing’s agency partnerships. Her role is to establish Kroger Precision Marketing as a leading brand building and business driving platform in the eyes of all agency constituents.

Prior to joining the company, she spent 10+ years at NBCUniversal engaging brands as a sales and digital planner for NBC News & MSNBC. She attended Boston College for her undergraduate and master’s education.

Adam is a data science leader with over 8 years of experience in marketing and media analytics. As Director of Data Science, Adam leads a high-performing data science team that partners with software engineering to bring accurate and scalable digital media measurement to life across Kroger Precision Marketing’s digital media portfolio. Prior to joining the company, Adam worked in MMM measurement at Nielsen and analytics at Rocket Fuel.

Adam attended Asbury University for his undergraduate education, where he studied Mathematics and Economics. He attainted his Masters in Applied Economics from Marquette University.

Katie is a graduate of the Miami University (Oxford, Ohio) and she also had an early start to her career at News America Marketing. Katie later joined Box Top Media prior to becoming SVP Sales at InStore Audio Network and recently Stingray Advertising. Katie’s over 20+ years in retail media along with her digital and print experience, makes Katie a valuable asset to both the company and her clients. Katie is active in many civic and charitable organizations in Defiance, OH where she and her husband, Rob, reside along with their dog, Lexi. Katie’s son, Jack, is a sophomore at Miami University.

A native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Gary graduated from Dartmouth College and joined News America Marketing to start his career in retail media. In 2003, Gary acquired POP Radio (Point-of-Purchase Radio), the largest provider of digital in-store audio messaging in the U.S. and rebranded the entity InStore Audio Network. In January 2022, InStore Audio Network was acquired by Stingray, a global digital media company based in Montreal with products ranging from retail media to FAST/SVOD/AVOD video, hundreds of streaming audio products, B2B and B2C digital offerings and over 100 radio stations in Canada. Gary is a private pilot and owns a 1959 Navion (post WWII trainer), is an avid golfer and resides in Princeton, NJ with his wife, Lauren. Personal excitement includes the birth of their first grandson in May.

Amie has over 15+ years of experience within the shopper media industry and has worked with many of the world’s biggest companies, including Johnson & Johnson, Mars, Coca-Cola, Unilever, Colgate, Henkel, Levi’s Energizer, Amex, Hershey’s as well as retailers, CVS, ALDI, The Home Depot, and more. A results-driven, innovative leader with extensive experience in all facets of retail marketing and advertising, she is the industry’s go-to expert on Commerce media, a practice she pioneered at UM. As head of this discipline for more than ten years, Amie conceptualized, developed, and launched UM’s first Commerce Media team supporting our current three solutions: “Commerce as a tactic” drives sales online and in store through 400+ global media retail networks, identifying consumers most likely to covert and connecting the dots on their consumer journey to reach point of sale.

Created out of the merge of data, tech, and retail media, “Commerce as a strategy” customizes each pathway to a specific user journey, using the latest data and advancements in shoppable tech to reach audiences where they are, with the right messages, at the likeliest moments of purchase.

“Commerce as content” engages shoppers with curated content based on their own media consumption and behaviors, creating a personalized advertising experience.

Amie has most recently been recognized as 40 under 40 from Ad Age as well as P2Pi. She was a 2021 Adweek Media All-Star, a 2020 Cynopsis Top Woman in Media, 2019 GenNext She Runs It winner, and won a spot as a 2022 MAKER. She has served as an Effie judge for the Commerce awards over the last four years and regularly speaks at the industry’s most prominent events.

An avid runner who has participated in over 10 marathons, Amie runs in support of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society to honor her friends and family who have lost their lives to these cancers, and also supports the National Blood Clot Alliance. She resides in Long Island, NY with her husband Rod, five-year-old son Connor, 22-month-old daughter Emma, and their dog Rigley.

Jonathan Lustig is the Head of Revenue at Walgreens Advertising Group (wag) – the data and media division of Walgreens, Inc that delivers next-gen advertising solutions and backed by the power of than 9,000 stores and 100+ million loyalty members. At wag, Jonathan is instrumental in bringing new, industry-leading closed loop solutions to both brand and shopper marketers and media agencies that span digital, OTT, CTV, social, in-store and more. Jonathan oversees account management, business development, marketing, planning and execution, revenue operations, sales and solutions insights functions of the business. Prior to Walgreens, Jonathan was the SVP of North American Sales for TripleLift during a time of immense growth for the organization. He is also a board member for the nonprofit Jambos, an organization that’s dedicated to bringing comfort to children in foster care.