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Blog / Insights
If you’re familiar with the retail media landscape, you’ve likely heard The Home Depot talk about how we’ve built strong, data-driven partnerships with our endemic brands. Through Orange Apron Media (OAM), The Home Depot’s retail media network, we’ve helped advertisers connect with customers, strengthen brand equity, and better align with merchandising in ways that drive meaningful results. We have come a long way, and it’s far from over.
Retail media isn’t just for the brands you’d expect to find in an aisle at The Home Depot. As retail media continues to evolve, campaigns aren’t just about pushing a specific product. They’re about connecting with a customer to solve a problem, no matter how big or small. The Home Depot is a place filled with signals of life stages, lifestyle, and intent. DIY customers come to us when they’re moving, growing, upgrading, and investing, and Pros come to us when they have a project that requires expertise, and they need the best tools and supplies for the job. This is what makes our audiences relevant to far more than paint and power tools.
Welcoming the Next Wave of Brands
Now, we are connecting customers with brands and services that can help them no matter the life event or project.
We’ve started working with non-endemic brands across categories like financial services, home security, insurance, automotive, and travel - companies that see tremendous value in reaching the same valuable audience we already know so well. A couple planning a kitchen remodel might also be thinking about refinancing. A homeowner buying a new washing machine might also be looking for better home insurance. These are connected moments, and we’re able to help brands show up for them.
Orange Apron Media helps non-endemic advertisers understand lifestyle insights, without needing to be on the shelf. This means brands can build strategies around behaviors and interests that go beyond traditional retail signals. When you think of customer segments think Small Business Owners, Movers, Sports Enthusiasts, Gift Givers, Tech Enthusiasts, Pet Lovers and the list goes on. These aren’t just audiences - these are actionable moments, and we’ve got a front-row seat to all of them.
Doing Data the Right Way
None of this works without relevant home improvement first-party data, and that’s where we come in. With signals from online traffic, in-store transactions, app interactions, and ProXtra, our professional contractor loyalty program, we have a nuanced view of the customer journey from inspiration to installation.
But data alone isn’t enough. It has to be activated in a way that is smart, secure, and scalable. Integration with Yahoo ConnectID allows The Home Depot to serve more relevant ads to customers who are looking for an answer to their problems. Yahoo DSP’s extensive, agnostic access to supply paired with our rich home improvement data segments can provide advertisers with a nearly endless variety of ways to reach customers closer to the point of purchase.
The result is simple: advertisers get access to the right shoppers at the right time, without relying on cookies or third-party shortcuts. And consumers see more relevant ads, which enhances the experience for everyone.
Omnichannel, On-Point
What’s most exciting to me is that these activations don’t live in a single lane. We’re delivering campaigns across display, video, native, and connected TV (CTV), making sure that the message matches both the moment and the medium.
A family shopping for moving boxes may receive a personalized offer for home insurance while watching their favorite streaming show. A contractor buying bulk materials could be served a video from a workwear brand that fits their lifestyle. These aren’t hypothetical - they’re happening now.
And because we’re tapping into these well-informed and agreed upon signals, we’re not guessing, we’re guiding. We’re helping brands reach people not just when they’re ready to buy, but when they’re ready to engage.
What Comes Next
At Orange Apron Media, we believe the future of retail media is about inclusion, and not just in terms of who can participate, but how value is defined. It’s about whether a brand has something that will help our customers in their day-to-day lives.
We’ll always support our endemic partners. They’re at the core of our industry. But we’re also here to help new brands, in new categories, find relevance in the home improvement journey. With the right data, the right tech, and the right mindset, retail media can be both a performance engine and a brand builder.
So, whether you're selling patio furniture, pet insurance, or a smart thermostat, there’s a place for you in our network. And we’re just getting started.
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About Melanie Babcock
Melanie Babcock is Vice President of Orange Apron Media and Monetization at The Home Depot. In this role, Melanie has grown sources of ad revenue, profitability, sales and improved supplier experience. Melanie joined The Home Depot in 2013, most recently serving as the VP of Integrated Media, which included the launch, development and growth of Orange Apron Media. Under Melanie’s leadership, her teams transformed The Home Depot’s marketing strategy from a product-centric to a customer-driven marketing strategy. She scaled personalized customer marketing and worked closely with cross-functional partners to lead the development of marketing experiences more tailored to customers’ shopping and personal preferences. She launched a media measurement practice and changed the marketing team’s key metrics to deliver enterprise, department and incremental sales.
