Nielsen Suspends PRISM In-Store Data Development
The Nielsen Co. has said it will suspend its plans to offer a syndicated in-store data service because of the troubled economic prospects facing many retailers.
The national data syndication service, titled PRISM, was meant to pull together sales and merchandising information from brands and retailers to give both groups an accurate picture of what shopper marketing tactics are most effective and produce the best return on investment, permitting side-by-side comparisons to other marketing spending.
The service has been in development since 2006 and in 2007 began to amass in-store data from 30 product makers and 16 retailers.
But Nielsen issued a statement Friday saying it would suspend development of the data service. The same day, the company began notifying marketers and others involved in the consortium of its decision, spokesman Jennifer Frighetto said.
“Over the past several weeks we’ve consulted with our clients and other companies in the industry,” the company said. “Given the nation’s serious economic state, Nielsen and its clients have decided this is not the right environment to launch a national syndicated service.”
Nielsen said that while merchant and brand clients still see the value of an in-store data service, it’s not in a position to support the service with subscriptions or other funding right now. The company said it would work on custom data solutions for individual clients “until a syndicated service is financially viable for many of our clients.”
PRISM, which stood for “Pioneering research for an In-Store Metric,” promised to examine point-of-purchase reach by retail departments and link display impressions to sales conversions to help merchants and manufacturers make better in-store decisions. The service planned to aggregate data ranging from shopper traffic and retail TV to shelf-talkers and digital signs.
Last December, development of the PRISM platform was thrown into question when Wal-Mart said it would pull out of the consortium to contribute store data to the service. According to a Nielsen statement at that time, the retail giant said its withdrawl was intended to remain “consistent with [Wal-Mart’s] internal data-sharing policies” and would not afftect the launch of the service.
But Walmart’s disappearance could have had an impact for some firms involved in the effort down the road, Nielsen said. Yet the firm maintains the service suspension is largely a victim of the weak economy.
“Walmart’s decision may have been a consideration for some of our clients,” Frighetto said. “But the major factor in our decision to suspend the service was the ability of companies in this economy to fund a syndicated service. Given the state of the economy, very few companies are able to free up money to invest in new ventures.”
Peter Hoyt, executive director of the In-Store Marketing Institute, called Nielsen’s decision a “setback” for shopper marketing.
“We are very disappointed,” Hoyt said Friday. “It was a very big undertaking. We got a lot of good from it, but we won’t realize the vision from it.”
What’s the impact of Nielsen’s decision? Hoyt said the suspension no doubt would slow the advance of shopper marketing. But he remained confident for the future.
“There is a lot we can build off of,” Hoyt added. “Someone will find a way to get this done. “I just don’t know when or how. It will somehow come back again. It just has to. We need this.”
