How Retail Media Teams Are Navigating Tariffs, Inflation, and Uncertainty: Q&A With The Bluebird Group’s CMO Jacob Snelson

2025 didn’t start with a whisper—it started with a whiplash. From a fresh wave of tariffs to persistent inflation and fluctuating consumer confidence, marketers are facing a new version of an old dilemma: how to plan, spend, and stay agile when the ground keeps shifting. Retail brands, in particular, are feeling the squeeze. Input costs are rising. Forecasts are tightening. And the pressure to protect margins is making marketing budgets one of the first places leadership looks to make cuts.

A new report from eMarketer projects that retail media spend could fall more than 8% under a heavy tariff scenario. According to MarTech, 94% of marketers say tariffs are likely to reduce their advertising budgets, with traditional media and social spend most at risk. At the same time, brands are testing promotions like “tariff sales” to preempt cost hikes, hoping to drive short-term demand while consumers brace for rising prices. 

But those are short-term moves. As Modern Retail recently put it, “If brands cut back on their marketing budgets now, they risk losing mindshare at a critical time, as customers are doing more research and becoming more selective about which brands they buy from.”

It’s a moment that demands clarity—but clarity is in short supply. Do you pull back and protect margins? Or stay invested and try to gain ground while others pull out? What makes this especially tricky for retail media teams is the unique nature of the space: it’s not just advertising—it’s inventory, pricing, supply chain, and shelf placement all rolled into one. And when the stakes are this high, the right decision isn’t always the obvious one.

Q&A with Jacob Snelson: insights from the frontlines of retail media

To unpack how retail media teams are really navigating all this—and what smart investment looks like in a moment of pressure—we sat down with Jacob Snelson, Chief Media Officer at The Bluebird Group. Jacob doesn’t deal in theory. He’s advising brands every day on how to stay visible, efficient, and strategic—even when conditions get rocky. Below, he shares why this isn’t the time for knee-jerk decisions, how brands can spot when it’s time to lean in, and why history favors those who keep showing up

With inflation shaping the year and tariffs piling on, how are retail media teams thinking about spend and strategy in the middle of all this?

Each brand has a unique situation and needs to build a plan for its situation. That hasn’t changed. But what’s shifting right now is the level of scrutiny being applied to every dollar. Across the board, we’re seeing a heavier lean toward efficiency, which means doubling down on products with stronger margins, consolidating around ad units that drive lower-funnel performance, and getting very clear on what’s actually incremental.

That focus isn’t just reactive—it’s strategic. During the late 2000s recession, McKinsey found that companies in the top tier of performance actually increased their marketing investment during the downturn. They weren’t spending wildly, but they leaned in when others pulled back—and came out delivering a positive return to shareholders while the average company lost ground. That kind of gap doesn’t just happen from cost-cutting. It happens when spending is smartly deployed during tight conditions.

For a lot of teams today, that means pulling back on broad awareness plays and rebalancing toward conversion and consideration. It also means pressure testing assumptions. Just because a product performed last quarter doesn’t mean it will hold up under changing pricing conditions or a new sourcing plan.

The reality is, outside of China, much of the tariff impact is still unfolding. We’re advising brands not to overreact too soon. For now, it’s about building contingency plans and staying close to the indicators. That includes supply chain inputs, media efficiency, competitive shifts—all of it. Because when you react too fast and pull spend across the board, it’s not just performance that takes a hit. It’s visibility. And once you lose shelf placement or market share, getting it back is a much longer road.

You’ve said this isn’t the moment for snap decisions. What’s your bigger-picture guidance for brands right now—and why does patience still matter?

Watch the market and see what opportunities arise over the next few weeks. We are already seeing CPCs come down across categories which is indicative of advertisers pulling out.

Studies have shown that during post-COVID inflation, big traditional brands are the first to cut budgets, paving the way for emerging brands to take market share. We have already seen this happen over the last two weeks,  including one client where a major player pulled out and opened the door.

A study by Kantar released in 2023 showed that brands that turn off ads lost market share and were unable to gain it back once they turned ads back on. Being patient is key because an opportunity may arise where investments have long-term beneficial impacts to your business.

Say a brand does choose to lean in. What’s the right way to approach it? Where should they focus, and what boundaries help keep it smart—not reactive?

First, lean into what drives the most impactful sales. Efficiency is key during these times. Understand your customer acquisition cost and cost for lifetime loyalty.

From an inventory perspective, understand your sell-through and what is on hand. Many brands are shifting their manufacturing around, and there is an opportunity to stay on sale through at an efficient rate with what you currently have in stock and in warehouses stateside.

Brands can also shift their ad-focused spend to FBM since brands can control the price and profitability more easily, while allowing FBA items to sell through organically. For US-based manufacturing brands, this is a great opportunity to double down. Brands could consider this an investment year to capture market share.

You make a strong case for having a data-driven plan. What does that actually look like, and which signals matter most when deciding to spend or stay put?

I’m a firm believer that data—both historical and predictive—should be what guides marketing decisions. Gut checks only get you so far. When the landscape is shifting this fast, you need real indicators to anchor your thinking. For us, that means building plans that flex, but don’t guess. The data should show you where the opportunity is—and where the risk actually lives.

The first signals we look for are decreasing CPCs, increasing Share of Voice, and rising conversion rates. If those three start moving together, it usually means one thing: competitors are pulling back. When that happens, it’s not just cheaper to win the auction—it’s easier to get noticed, and easier to convert. We’ve already seen that in multiple categories this month, where CPCs dropped double digits and ROAS spiked, not because we changed the strategy, but because others backed off.

That’s exactly when you want to lean in.

But putting together a data-driven plan means more than checking CPCs. It’s about knowing your own baselines. How fast does your SOV usually move when competitors pull back? What are your breakpoints for profitable acquisition? What’s your supply chain actually able to support if performance scales? If you don’t know those numbers, even the best signals won’t help you make the right call in the moment.

That’s where we spend a lot of time with clients—setting the thresholds, modeling the scenarios, and making sure when things shift, there’s no panic. Just a plan.

You’ve spent time digging into Search Query Performance data. In a market like this, how can doubling down there help teams make cleaner, faster calls?

Search Query Performance has been incredibly beneficial to Bluebird brands for advertising strategies. We are using SQP to monitor and predict ad success and opportunity by looking at purchase share and click share and coupling it with CPC and ROAS to find the best incremental opportunity keywords for our brands.

We have staffed an ad measurement and data scientist lead to create models to predict purchase share growth at differing levels of investments. These models are using query-level signals to prioritize keywords and spend that are 1) most profitable for our brands and 2) have the largest opportunity.

Anything we can do to provide efficiency in ad spend is key. And if you’re using Seller Central (where this data exclusively lives for the moment) even better—that’s where SQP is strongest. Brands not tapping into that visibility are already behind.

Anything we can do to provide efficiency in ad spend is key.

Conclusion: when others pause, you prepare

This isn’t the first time brands have been forced to make hard calls in an uncertain market. But the brands that win are rarely the ones that pull back the fastest. They’re the ones who stay grounded in their data, stay connected to performance signals, and act when others hesitate.

What makes this moment different is how layered the decision-making has become. It’s not just a question of “Should we keep spending?” It’s “Where are we exposed? Where do we have control? And how do we protect the foundation while staying aggressive enough to grow?”

As Jacob puts it, “You can’t just cut spend and expect to hold your ground. The second-order effects are real—on share, on shelf, on visibility. You either prepare to hold your spot, or you’re preparing to give it up.”

This isn’t about overspending—it’s about staying ready. Build the plan now. Track the right signals. And be ready—because when the opportunity shows up, it won’t wait for your next budget cycle.

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