Unpacking the Digital Shelf

Hosted by Digital Shelf Institute

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387

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Aug 2026

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About the show

Let’s talk through the future of brand manufacturing in the digital age. Welcome to Unpacking the Digital Shelf. For more commerce content for all brands CPG & beyond, visit us at www.digitalshelfinstitute.org

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60 recent

August 17, 202634 min

De-Siloing Your Org is Easier than You Think, with Lynsey Sweales, International Consultant & Facilitator, Founder of Cognitive Union

The consumer journey is under one of the greatest transformations since, well, ecommerce. As AI and agents enable consumers to ask their individual questions, it is the challenger brands that are adapting to meet the moment and steal market share across many categories. Organizational silos are one of the greatest impediments to serving the consumer how, when, and where they want it. Lynsey Sweales, International Consultant & Facilitator, Founder of Cognitive Union, has found a solution that has transformed the operations of many brands. You all need to talk to each other. It’s the power of education and empathy, centered on the consumer, that has successfully brought silos down. Lynsey explains it all to us.

August 11, 202627 min

From Margins to Mainstream: The Rise of Marketplaces in Australia with Mark Mansour - Managing Director, Woolworths MarketPlus

Marketplaces have evolved from the fringes of retail to one of its most significant growth engines. With nearly one in three Australian retailers now operating a marketplace, brands are rethinking how and where they compete. In this episode, Teresa is joined by Mark Mansour, Managing Director of Woolworths MarketPlus, to explore the rapidly changing marketplace landscape. Together, they discuss what's driving retailers to launch marketplaces, how brands should think about where to play and how to win, what strong retailer-brand partnerships look like, and how AI and agentic commerce may shape the future of marketplaces. A must-listen for brands navigating the next era of digital commerce.

August 10, 202636 min

Leadership through Change Sometimes Starts with One Word, with Jennifer Angelus, Sr. Director of Digital Shelf, Ecosystems, and Capabilities at Danone

Moments of great transformation, chaos, and opportunity, as we are in now, require thoughtful and transformational leadership. Now in her 11th year at Danone, Jennifer Angelus has elevated her career from an associate manager of shopper insights to now leading the digital, agentic, and brand.com strategies as the Sr. Director of Digital Shelf, Ecosystems, and Capabilities at Danone. Jennifer graciously agreed to share with our community how she inspires cohesion, connection, and scale to serve the consumer and drive growth.

August 4, 202632 min

Plumbing the Digital Pipeline: Defining E-Commerce for Wholesale Distribution with Sarah Kirwen Director of eCommerce at Oatey

Today, we are diving deep into a topic that is both incredibly massive and frequently misunderstood: the evolution of B2B digital commerce. If you ask five different people in a B2B manufacturing company to define "e-commerce," you’ll likely get five completely different answers. To some, it’s just Amazon. To others, it’s a customer portal. And to the traditional sales team, it can feel like a learning curve. Today, we are unpacking what e-commerce actually means in the complex world of wholesale distribution. Our guest, Sarah Kirwen, Director of ecommerce at Oatey, didn’t just inherit a digital strategy—she had to build the glossary, set the boundaries, and educate a legacy industry on why the digital shelf is the ultimate growth engine.

August 3, 202637 min

Curiosity is the Secret Ingredient in Your Growth Strategy, with Keith Lehman, Global Director, Digital Commerce Marketing at Colgate-Palmolive

Running the global digital and insights organization at one of the world’s largest and most storied CPG companies takes a combination of data chops, marketing savvy, and collaborative leadership skills. Keith Lehman, Global Director, Digital Commerce Marketing at Colgate-Palmolive has all of that, but in addition he credits his intense curiosity for being the additional element that helps drive the processes to help his internal customers uncover the next best action for growth. Keith joins the podcast to explain how they are building the machine to power Colgate’s next era of growth.

July 27, 202641 min

Nourishing Long Term Consumer Value from Ages 1 to 101, with Catherine Hayden, Chief Marketing Officer at Kate Farms

Can you imagine a CPG company with an 87% customer retention rate and a 50% subscribe and save rate on Amazon? Wouldn’t you want to know their secret? Well now you can, thanks to our guest today, Catherine Hayden, Chief Marketing Officer at Kate Farms, the #1 doctor-recommended plant-based nutrition brand. She recounts the journey that got them where they are today, and explains their tremendous investment in product quality, customer care, and medical research that drives trust and long term customer value.

July 20, 202637 min

The Leadership Mindset that Drives Growth and Innovation in Any Era, with Sha Atakhanov, Vice President of Marketing & Commerce at Boiron

VP of Marketing & Commerce Sha Atakhanov has been driving growth and innovation at homepathic brand Boiron for almost 17 years. From booking some of the first ads on Amazon to being an inaugural brand running shoppable ads on Samsung TVs, , Sha oversees all the channels and media that touch the consumer, and he approaches new opportunities and tech, especially AI, with a simple rule - it has to generate revenue, save time, and save money. And have some fun while you’re at it.

July 13, 202629 min

The Latest Data on AI Adoption in Commerce, with Jack O’Leary, Director, eCommerce Strategic Insights at NIQ

AI adoption in shopping is growing steadily, though demographic variations in this trend may influence where brands prioritize their investments.That’s why Nielsen IQ and the DSI teamed up on a combined report featuring consumer attitudes about AI in commerce, and brands leaders POV on how it is impacting their work and investments. Jack O’Leary, Director, eCommerce Strategic Insights at NIQ joins with the consumer numbers, and our own Lauren Livak Gilbert shares the brand data for a holistic view of the trajectory of AI in commerce.

July 7, 202636 min

The 5 C’s of Product Data with Jason Hein, Global Director B2B eCommerce Association

Welcome to the very first episode of Unpacking the Digital Shelf: B2B Edition. To kick off this new series, we are joined by industry veteran Jason Hein. Jason brings over a decade of merchandising experience from McMaster-Carr and a foundational role building out Amazon Business's industrial catalog—but more importantly, he brings a fantastic sense of humor and a gift for storytelling that makes complex data actually fun to talk about. Today, he’s unpacking his 5 C’s of Product Data framework, sharing how to translate heavy technical jargon for everyday buyers, and giving us the exact tactical blueprint to build a data model that scales. Let's unpack it.

July 6, 202630 min

A Humanist Spin on Machine-to-Machine Marketing, with Jason Carmel, Global Creative Data Lead at VML

The digital shelf has been joined by the agentic shelf — with AI agents no longer just tools in our marketing arsenal, they are emerging as a powerful, influential consumer segment actively shaping discovery, evaluation, and purchase decisions. In this audio version of a keynote from the Digital Shelf Summit, Jason Carmel, Global Creative Data Lead at VML, explains why enterprises need to re-think their marketing strategy to account for consumer machine agents, and how to do so while preserving authentic human connection.