Winning the Year Ahead: The Media Strategy FMCG Brands Need for 2025
A strategic look at the year ahead—timing, trends, and must-know insights for maximising media investment in grocery and convenience.
The marketing world is awash with predictions for 2025. If you believe the usual suspects, this will be the year AI will finally take over, blockchain will revolutionise advertising, and TikTok will become the new Super Bowl. Meanwhile, back in reality, most FMCG brands will still be fighting for the same limited shelf space, competing on price promotions, and battling for attention in an oversaturated media landscape. The fundamentals haven’t changed—brands that win in 2025 will be the ones that get their media strategy right, not the ones chasing every shiny new thing.
So, what should FMCG marketers actually focus on in the year ahead? Here’s your no-nonsense guide to aligning media plans with retailer range reviews and marketing windows to ensure you’re investing in what works, not what’s trendy.
1. Retailer Timelines Rule Everything
The biggest mistake FMCG marketers make is treating media plans as an isolated exercise rather than a weapon in their battle for shelf space. It doesn’t matter how much reach your campaign generates if your product isn’t where consumers expect to find it.
In 2025, the most successful FMCG brands will be those that align their media spend with retailer range review cycles. Supermarkets don’t care about your media strategy—they care about what’s going to drive their category sales and margins. If you’re not making a compelling case with marketing support at the right time, don’t be surprised when your product gets delisted for the next new thing.
Action: Map your retailer range review dates and plan your biggest bursts of media activity to coincide with these critical decision-making periods. Your media spend isn’t just about consumers—it’s about influencing buyers.
2. Stop Worshipping Digital at the Expense of Effectiveness
Digital is efficient, measurable, and flexible. It’s also a money pit for FMCG brands when used in isolation. The past decade has seen too many brands prioritising hyper-targeted, bottom-funnel digital over the mass reach of TV, radio, and out-of-home—usually because a media agency or platform told them to. The result? Brands with solid click-through rates but declining penetration.
For most grocery and convenience brands, growth still comes from increasing household penetration, not from squeezing a few extra conversions out of already loyal buyers. That means mass reach still matters. Yes, digital has a role—but only as part of a balanced media mix. If your 2025 plan is 90% programmatic display and social media ads, congratulations: You’re making Jeff Bezos richer, not building your brand.
Action: Balance your media plan. Invest in broad reach channels that drive mental availability while using digital for precision where it makes sense.
3. Use Promotions Wisely—They’re a Media Channel Too
Most FMCG brands spend more on promotions than they do on marketing. The problem? Too many brands treat price cuts and discounts as an inevitable cost rather than a strategic weapon. A well-timed price promotion, supported by media investment, can drive volume and retailer support. A poorly executed one just trains shoppers to wait for the next discount.
Retailers want brands that create excitement, not just margin erosion. A promo supported by above-the-line investment can turn a standard price cut into an event that drives category growth. Conversely, running a deep discount without marketing support is just handing money to retailers while devaluing your brand.
Action: Treat promotions as a media channel. Support key price campaigns with media to maximise their impact and reinforce long-term brand equity.
4. Don’t Mistake Trends for Strategies
Every year, we get the same song and dance about how the next big platform is going to change everything. Remember when Clubhouse was the future of brand engagement? Or when voice search was going to kill Google? There’s always a new distraction just waiting to siphon off marketing budgets from proven strategies.
In 2025, you’ll hear about the metaverse (again), AI-generated influencers, and whatever else the ad industry is hyping up this quarter. The truth is, none of these things will move the needle for your brand as much as getting the basics right: consistent media investment, strong creative, and proper alignment with retailer timelines.
Action: Ignore fads. If a trend doesn’t have a clear, measurable impact on your brand’s penetration, it’s a waste of time.
5. Creative Still Matters (Yes, Really)
Amid all the talk of media efficiency, targeting, and AI-driven optimisation, too many brands forget one inconvenient truth: The quality of your creative is still the single biggest driver of advertising effectiveness.
FMCG brands are obsessed with tweaking media plans but often settle for forgettable, wallpaper-level advertising. The best strategy in the world won’t save you if your ad is dull, confusing, or instantly skippable. The Ehrenberg-Bass Institute has repeatedly shown that distinctive, well-branded, emotional advertising drives long-term growth. But in an era where marketers are terrified of taking creative risks, too many brands default to generic category cues and forgettable executions.
Action: Spend as much time worrying about your creative as you do about your media plan. A great ad in an average media plan beats a terrible ad in a perfect one.
Final Thought: Book Your Strategy Session
FMCG marketing isn’t about chasing the latest trend or optimising every media buy within an inch of its life. It’s about using media to drive distribution, influence retailers, and build mental availability over time.
If your 2025 plan isn’t aligned with key retailer range reviews and promotional windows, you’re leaving money—and shelf space—on the table.
We can fix that. Book a strategy session if you'd like to talk through your media investment and make sure it works hardest in 2025.