When Campaign Results Aren't Enough — Molly Hjelm, RedVest Media — The Middlemen Podcast

When Campaign Results Aren't Enough — Molly Hjelm, RedVest Media

S3 E23 · Sep 1, 2026 · 27 min

Ace Hardware's RedVest Media held its first upfront at Wrigley Field, about a year after launching. Tom sat down with Molly Hjelm, Corporate Vice President and Head of Retail Media at Ace Hardware, at the end of the day to talk about what RedVest has learned, what it announced, and where it's headed in 2027.

Ace's co-op structure makes retail media different. More than 2,800 independent owners operate 5,300 U.S. stores, so getting onto a planogram doesn't necessarily mean getting into every store. Molly explains how RedVest's Retailer Reach is helping brands market directly to Ace retailers and grow distribution, while its broader media toolkit gives everyone from Ace's biggest strategic brands to one- and two-SKU vendors ways to build demand.

They also get into one of the tensions between retail media and merchandising: a great campaign result isn't necessarily a great business result. Molly shares how Ace's merchants pushed RedVest to look beyond campaign returns and measure total business impact. Plus, Ace's new social and influencer capabilities through Influential, using social amplification to connect creator content with deterministic Ace audiences, DoorDash bringing new customers to Ace, and what's next for in-store media.

One year after RedVest launched, the bigger question is where retail media fits into Ace's growth strategy. Ace has grown enterprise marketing investment from roughly $30 million to $240 million while growing the business from roughly $3 billion to $10 billion.

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