Instacart

Instacart sits at the center of the industry's brand-vs-performance reckoning, featured in both Digiday's case for and against retail media as brand-building channels and WERSM's argument that networks want brand budgets while systems still reward conversion. The coverage suggests its challenge is no longer proving ROAS but proving upper-funnel value across CTV/offsite, programmatic, and measurement. Trajectory points toward having to rewire incentives and proof points if it wants to unlock incremental brand dollars rather than just defend trade spend.