Could Dollar General’s AI Ads Change Retail Forever? | Fast Five Shorts

Dollar General's media network announced this week that they are rolling out an AI enabled in store audio program to approximately 6,000 stores across 48 states through a new partnership with Cusic, a move that will double the discount retailers existing in store audio footprint and bring the total number of Dollar General stores with audio capabilities to 12,000 by the second quarter of 2026, according to retail Dive.

The Cusic platform combines point of sale data curated music and AI generated audio ads to deliver localized real tailored to each store environment.

The platform is designed to give brand partners improved attribution and performance visibility, Q6 closed loop reporting capabilities aligned with IAB standards, enabling advertisers to measure incremental impact and link campaign exposure to actual sales outcomes.

Jen, is AI powered in Store Audio?

This is a little bit of a leading question.

Is AI AI powered in Store Audio the most underrated retail media channel out there?

And right now as we speak, I.

Think it's underrated, but it comes with real risk.

The upside is it reaches customers, you know, at the exact moment of decision in store.

You know, it's incredibly powerful and especially if you think about Dollar General General's like value driven, mission based shopper.

But to me, I think it could inherently annoy customers if it's not done well.

You know, audio is, is interruptive.

Right?

It feels like advertising instead of something helpful or timely.

And if it, and if it really turns to in that vein, people will tune it out quickly.

And I was thinking about this, but the other piece isn't just that customer experience play, it's truly more of a monetization play.

You know, when you think about like retail media networks, they're building it out and I think that's a high margin revenue stream layered on top of a very low margin business.

So this is really about turning the store into a media channel.

And the question is whether they can do it in a way that adds value instead of noise.

Right, right, right.

Which is interesting because you know, as you look at In Store Audio, In Store audio in Europe is a much bigger thing than it is in the United States.

And so, and, and that's kind of, and the, and I think the reason for that is what you're saying, right Jen.

It's, it's the brand.

It's like are do we want that as we're shopping?

But, but I mean you guys, you guys are Both experiencing in QSRs and, and you know, convenience operations and Dollar General, like the dynamics in some of those retail environments are different than say like a department store so.

So, Jen, like, how much do you think that fear is real versus, like, is this just something we think is out there?

I think it depends how different the US consumer is to those abroad.

And it basically, this will work if it feels like guidance, but it'll fail if it feels like advertising.

So I think we have to make sure that it's truly additive to the experience versus a distraction and creates too much noise for the consumer and actually is a detractor from the overall experience and makes them want to go somewhere else.

So how would you.

How.

If you're gonna.

So.

So Grant.

So granted, you said you think this is an underrated approach to retail media, and for the reasons it's underrated is like, you get a lot of like relative to like a digital screen, which is what I always come back to.

Right.

It's much cheaper than putting a digital screen in your store.

It's much easier to operate.

It gets you more impressions too, because it hits everyone versus whoever's just seeing the digital screen.

You can align it to your point of sale.

Those are all the benefits of it.

So, like.

But taking take that with a grain of salt, if I'm hearing you right, is like, okay, you know, but at the same time, like, it could be more disruptive to my shopping experience than just passing by an ad on a digital screen.

So if you were to do it, what type of ads would you try to place in this underrated or underappreciated retail media network?

I think they're ads that would appeal to folks senses.

Like you said, we're shifting from screens to senses.

And so in that moment, how are you appealing to the consumer and helping them make a better decision and resonating in that moment of the journey versus coming across as like a pure advertisement that feels distracting or disjointed from the moment in the store?

Yeah, I kind of.

Look, I kind of actually, I find a lot of analogies from what the convenience stores are doing at the pump, you know, like highlighting their deals of the day.

Like, you just give your deals of the day every hour on the hour and just see what happens, you know, as an experiment, see what the responses are from the customers, see if they vote with their wallets and, you know, go from there.

But I think it's a quick, easy win to try to understand or, you know, hey, did you remember to get your flu shot this year?

You know, stop by our pharmacy if you forgotten to do that, you know, like all that type of thing.

But John, what do you think?

Are you where do you come down in this argument?

Yeah, I think generally speaking, you know, the retail media networks broadly, huge opportunity.

Right.

And I think this is another channel, another example of the Dollar General is offering.

I think the thing that the nuance that I think about is it's also about the brand partners and where they are wanting to invest.

And I think fundamentally there's a limited amount of trade spend that they're going to, you have to invest behind their products.

And I think you need to think about right now you can do a lot with that trade spend.

You can invest in retail media networks and push certain marketing messaging to consumers, try to engage them that way.

And you can also invest in discounts and promotions and things like that.

And I just think about, you know, what is going to be the most effective right now and have the highest return on, on those trade spend dollars.

And I think about the consumer and the consumer is, you know, we see it all across consumer facing industries.

They're, they're a little more reticent, they're a little bit more being more intentional on where they're spending.

You know what is going to make the most, what's going to have the best return for them.

Is it going to be focusing on promos and discounts and so on or is it going to be investing in some of the new channels on the retail media networks that are opening up?

I don't know.

Right, right.

Yeah.

No, I think, you know, full disclosure here for the audience.

I mean most people probably know this.

Listen to me, I'm an advisor for Juki which is in this space.

So I was actually pumped to see this announcement from Dollar General because it validates what I've been saying for a while that in store audio is an untapped part of the media network.

And I hear you, I, you know Jen, I hear you too.

I mean I think that's always the question I have too is you know, how will it resonate with the brand.

But to me I think like there are retailers where they're people are just not going to be as concerned about that.

Dollar General, the right regional grocer which already has kind of an advertising positioning with their clientele on a regular basis.

Convenience stores, like I said with the kind of gas pump analogy that's already out there and it is a way of life in Europe.

So I always ask the question like why are we so different than Europeans or are we just slow to the game here?

Because it is a much, it is a much easier way to attribute and drive sales via in store than say all these expensive, you know, activations that we're seeing.

So I think for me it would be step one in my retail media exploration or experimentation plan.

100%.

But Jen, what do you think?

I think the most interesting thing will be how it connects with younger generations like Gen Alpha.

They've grown up just in this influencer centric environment and they see influencers as their friends or folks that will just sell them things and they're okay with that.

They're okay with more of this like advertising centric way of communication.

So I think this could work really well with Gen Alpha because they're going to see it as additive to the experience, whereas it might be a little bit more polarizing for older generations as well.

So less of the US versus European centric and more, I think it'll attract the important younger generations, potentially even more so and resonate with them at a higher altitude.

Well, that's really interesting too.

And John, the other point too, I never thought about the dynamics of young versus old.

There's also the macroeconomic climate right now, like experimenting with this type of thing, even if it's promotional, could go a long way with a lot of your customers at the end of the day too.

Right.

Like so if you're going to try, it seems like the next couple of years with everything going on with you know, oil and cost of food and all that this is ripe for experimentation, right John?

Yeah, absolutely.

So in the pressures that you pointed to on the consumer side, but then also just like the level of competition, you know, within this space is also, you know, you know, hyperdrive.

Right.

Right now and you know, you mentioned convenience stores.

You know, there's, it's really the ecosystem of you know, discount retailers like your dollar generals.

It's convenience stores, it's grocery, it's restaurants.

They're all competing for the same, you know, consumers and customers.

And so it's hyper competitive environment right now.

There's a lot of headwinds on the, on the consumer so.

Absolutely.

I think, you know, companies need to get creative on how they're going to compete and win in that environment.

The macro environment is absolutely, you know, not, not easy by any means.

That's the understatement of the show.

You got the quote of the show and the understatement of the show, John.