I have praised the way Tesco has adapted to the emergence of smartphones as a marketing tool, particularly in the UK by combining Loyalty card use, Dunnhumby data mining and smartphones.

Sensibly Tesco are migrating this technology elsewhere in their growing global footprint, including Korea with the use of virtual supermarkets to add value to shoppers by easing their time burden. 

Recently Tesco also bought US start-up specialist social marketing agency BzzAgent, highlighting their determination to push the boundaries  of social media and technology turning the emerging technical capabilities into marketing tools.

Australian retailers are dragging their feet badly, but with all the ex Tesco management now in Coles, there will be movement on leveraging the data on store cards and into net shopping pretty soon. Others will follow as they get their acts together, so suppliers to retail need to get their heads around how these changes will impact them in an environment where the change over the last few years has been huge, and they lose control of their brands via the rapid market share increase of housebrands as they become the Sku of choice for retailers.