Retail chain WHSmith brings first airport ad network into the specialty retail media race

Stuart Michell, chief commercial officer at WHSmith North America, said the network’s appeal rested on the huge numbers of people who routinely trudge through American airports — some 2.3 million a day, according to a 2023 Transportation Security Administration (TSA) estimate.

“We’ve got this huge captive audience going through the airport,” said Michell. “We know that they have dwell time. We know that they have a high propensity to spend.”

PepsiCo’s Frito-Lay and audio equipment maker Bose have already booked campaigns with WHSmith’s network, Michell said. He declined to share the company’s revenue expectations for the network or financial details of its founding clients’ deals.

In the U.K., WHSmith operates a well-known chain of newsstands under its own brand. But the company also operates 250 airport stores under localized brand names in the U.S. Its outlet at LaGuardia Airport in New York, for example, operates as the Bowery Bay Stores. WHSmith also counts some 90 stores in casino resorts in Las Vegas and Atlantic City alongside two railway outlets in its portfolio.

Retail media consultancy SMG was hired to help build the network for WHSmith. Partnerships struck with the TSA, Meta and The Trade Desk would enable advertisers to access audience data that includes store and footfall in airport terminals, according to SMG’s Sean Crawford, managing director for North America.

That data, he said, would let brands run digital ads targeting passengers during their transit through the airport.

“That’s a commercial opportunity,” said Crawford. “When [people] are on their way through the airport, we can start hitting [them] with display ads and in their feeds, and then link that to in-store offers.”

Advertisers are hardly strangers to that opportunity. ReachTV, for example, operates a free ad-supported streaming television network via TV screens in 750 airport and hotel venues across North America. The network draws 54 million viewers, Lynnwood Bibbens, founder and CEO of ReachTV, told Digiday in an email.

“Our unique offering, custom content and extremely highly valued audience has driven our demand to an all-time high,” he added.

Demand for airport out-of-home, like the rest of that sector, dipped during the pandemic years. But according to Richard Simkins, commercial and partnerships director at JCDecaux Airport, there’s been a “fantastic return to growth” since then.

In JC Decaux’s latest quarterly results, which cover the third quarter of 2024, the company banked $360 million (€346.9 million) in global revenue for travel inventory, which includes airport media.

eMarketer predicted last year that retail media spend would rise to $166 billion in 2025. WHSmith is the latest in a long line of companies that have looked to retail media for new revenue. By this point, media buyers have well over 200 retail media networks to choose from.

WHSmith’s initiative follows other efforts to increase the supply of retail media audience data and ad inventory from unexpected corners. The Home Depot launched its RMN in March; Expedia launched a travel-focused network last May; while real estate firm RE/MAX launched its own effort in November.

Earlier this month, Amazon began selling retailers the tech behind its own retail media networks, with the aim of shepherding smaller businesses into the media supply chain.

“Specialist RMNs offer a unique opportunity … for advertisers and buyers, there is an increased access to audiences in increasingly unique environments, which lend themselves to often very specific outcomes,” said Angus Dowie, regional sales manager for EMEA and APAC at AdVendio, a company that provides software to manage campaigns using retail media networks.

JC Decaux’s Simkins said airport OOH space was useful for brands hoping to reach high-frequency travelers, particularly “business decision makers” and “high net worth” audiences. “There’s so many brands who are looking to access and influence those key audiences that it really is open to the vast majority of brands,” he said.

Retail media is among the fastest-growing segments of the industry. The IAB’s 2025 Outlook Study, which surveyed media buyers, estimated retail media spend was set to grow 15.6% in 2025, compared with 7.3% for all segments. But that’s fallen from 25.1% in 2024 — owing to the sector’s increasingly complex landscape and lack of standardization, according to the survey.

Speciality retail media networks might hold particular appeal for brands in search of a niche audience (such as business travelers, in WHSmith’s case).

But for large brand advertisers in search of scale, such networks just add one more segment to the “long tail” of retail media, said Kevin Goodwin, vp of digital marketing at media agency New Engen. “It would be very low on the list relative to all the other retail media or digital out-of-home type placements we could buy,” Goodwin said.