How Nordstrom uses in-store displays and social content to build its retail media business

“The fundamental thing to know about retail media is that the focus is to drive performance for our brand partners. And the way you do that is by bettering the customer experience,” said Aaron Dunford, vp of Nordstrom Media.

Modern Retail spoke with Dunford following his appearance at Shoptalk 2025 in Las Vegas to discuss Nordstrom’s approach to retail media. Digital sales represent about 36% of the company’s sales, per its latest earnings report, while the rest come from its network of 350-plus stores, including 92 Nordstrom locations and 277 Nordstrom Racks. It’s planning at least 20 more store openings this year.

Since launching in 2021, Nordstrom Media Network has worked with more than 100 brands, Dunford said. Recent examples include in-store displays that bring together multiple brands around a shared theme. Currently, about 17 stores have a curated “Swim Shop” for beach gear and swimwear with brands like Maaji and Beach Riot. Last season, 18 stores had “Alpine Bound” displays for winter gear from The North Face and Halfdays. Nordstrom also harnesses its network of stylists, who can feature a participating brand on their own social accounts.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

How does Nordstrom go beyond banner ads and targeted displays with its retail media campaigns?
“In-store is a big initiative for us, which may be different than what you’ve experienced traditionally with retail media. A lot of our sales continue to be in-store, and the customer wants that experience. With the younger customers, they’re craving for a tangible experience where they can be inspired. So we’ve done things like creative, visually immersive experiences that when our customers are shopping,  it makes it more engaging and fun and you have better discovery and inspiration.

Early on in our retail media journey, we connected our brands with our stylists and said, ‘Hey, you can work with our stylist to produce content.’ And the stylists posted on their channels because a lot of our stylists are influencers and creators themselves. And then we use that same content and promote it in more paid channels, like paid social. And that not only creates an amazing storytelling device — because our stylists are so connected to our customers and can share so much about the brand — but it also creates better performance. Our stylist-produced content sees double the engagement of our traditional content.” 

How does the creative collaboration of the campaigns work?
“It’s 100% a partnership. What we feel is unique for Nordstrom is that we’re doubling down on our creative because — going back to making that connection between the customer and the brand — we need to tell that story. 

In traditional retail media, the creative is pretty much plug and play, like a standard asset that you put everywhere. You may put a logo on top of it, and that’s kind of it. That’s not delivering on telling your story to the customer. And so we’ve created an offering within our retail media where we have a really good creative agency where we’re co-creating content with our brands. We sit down and say, ‘What are the stories we want to tell?’ and we brief the creative agency and deliver that creative both in video — like long-story formats that we can use in things like CTV — and also in more compelling social assets.”

We’re often hearing from brands about pricing going up for retail media ads. When brands approach Nordstrom Media, are there packages they can choose from with where they are advertising?
“If you’re focused on the customer-driving performance, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. We stay away from things like packages and work with the brand and say, ‘What are you looking to accomplish? And then, based upon that, let’s design a specific plan for you.’ So it’s kind of a higher touch, higher engagement and more focused [approach], but we think it’s worth it because it produces better outcomes.”