Everyone wants to be different; yet increasingly everyone is different in exactly the same way. That was perhaps the unintended takeaway from Showcase , the inaugural retail and commerce media upfront held in New York on 2 September. Organised by Ascendant Network, the event brought 15 retail and commerce media businesses together to pitch themselves to agencies and advertisers, with networks spanning The Home Depot, Albertsons, DoorDash, PayPal, Macy’s, Chase, Instacart, Walgreens and others. Home improvement, grocery, delivery, payments, banking, petcare, pharmacy and department stores were all represented. Everyone has data At The Home Depot, Orange Apron Media talked about understanding the customer journey through everything from browsing to video viewing and interactions with its chatbot.