The Weekly 10: marketing, media and industry statistics to know now — January 14, 2026 edition

From U.S. consumers’ preference for regional grocers to the spike in online holiday shopping returns, these are the data points we’re paying attention to right now.

The number of Walmart stores that plan to add drone delivery this year, according to the retailer’s drone technology partner, Wing (an Alphabet subsidiary).

The number of U.S. workers who will benefit from new state and local minimum wage increases going into effect this year, injecting an estimated $5 billion into the consumer economy, according to the Economic Policy Institute.

The share of Gen Alpha customers who say they’d shop in-store (instead of online) in order to see and experience products, according to a new study from MG2, echoing findings regarding younger consumers (specifically Gen Zers and Millennials) of research conducted by The Harris Poll and presented by Quad in 2025.

The total amount of commercial airtime that Anheuser-Busch has purchased for Super Bowl LX on Feb. 8, according to Adweek, which reports that the brewer will debut new creative for Budweiser, Bud Light and Michelob Ultra.

The share of U.S. bank customers who have visited a physical branch within the past 24 months, per new Kantar research.

Texas-based H-E-B’s ranking in the new Dunnhumby annual customer preference index for the grocery category, based on a survey of 11,000 U.S. shoppers. Notably, regional grocers took all three top spots, with New England’s Market Basket second and Wisconsin-based Woodman’s in third.

The estimated value of Paramount’s latest bid to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, which the latter’s board rejected last week (in favor of a differently structured offer from Netflix), according to a New York Times report on the escalating tensions between the two media companies.

The year-over-year increase in online sales among brands that used their own AI agents during holiday shopping — versus 3.9% among brands that didn’t — according to a new Salesforce report.

The share of online purchases made between Nov. 1 and Dec. 31 that have already been returned — up 10% from 2024 — according to the same Salesforce research.

The live same-day viewership on CBS for the 2026 Golden Globes on Sunday, per Nielsen data shared with Deadline — down from last year (9.27 million) but still far ahead of the all-time low (6.3 million) in 2023.