How can retailers combat shoplifters?

Retailers have recently reported that they are increasingly dealing with a problem of shoplifting in addition to the rising cost of living issues and inflation. According to the British Retail Consortium, about 850 incidents of violence or abuse against shop workers are recorded every day in Britain and have cost retailers billions. Most recently, after learning that one of its stores was robbed three times in one day, the managing food director of Co-op warned that retail crime is “out of control.”

According to newly published data from the group, this year saw the highest levels ever of retail crime, stealing, and anti-social behaviour, with the store logging nearly 1,000 instances every day. The company added that one of its inner city London stores was “looted” three times in a single day and that there were more than 175,000 instances in the first half of 2023, an increase of more than a third over the previous year.

In a bid to deter shoplifters, Co-op has decreased the amount of expensive items on display in some stores and placed dummy items on the shelves to draw customers to staff. Similarly, Waitrose and John Lewis is reportedly offering free hot drinks and discounted food to on-duty police officers who visit its stores in a bid to cut shoplifting and violence against staff, according to the Times.

The news comes after Waitrose reported that assaults on its employees have roughly “doubled” since 2020. The retailers hope that the new initiative will deter thieves as they see police vehicles parked outside the stores. Teenagers ran uncontrolled through stores on Oxford Street earlier this month during the “TikTok looting” that occurred there after a thread encouraging people to “rob JD Sports” went viral. So are retailers facing a new crime wave? And what is the reason behind a growing number of shoplifters?

The crime of shoplifting appears to reflect social need as it increases when the economy is weak. The cost of living crisis appears to be contributing to the present uptick. However, Nicki Juniper, head of security for the John Lewis Partnership said that retailers across the board are seeing a rise in crime. This isn’t driven by a need to put food on the table, but rather professional shoplifters stealing for greed over need.

“Shoplifting isn’t a victimless crime; it costs the sector more than £1 billion a year, driving up prices for genuine customers. Likewise, some shoplifters are aggressive or threatening to retail staff – which is unacceptable,” she says. Similarly, The Co-op managing food director, Matt Hood, argued that recent suggestions that shoplifting has risen in recent months because families cannot afford their groceries amid the cost-of-living crises are false. “No, it’s fundamentally because people are using baby formula to cut drugs. They’re using it for organised crime,” Hood adds.

Lara Conradie, communication adviser at the BRC attributed the rise in shoplifting to the cost of living, but she also said that crime in general is increasing in society and a lot of retailers are noticing more organised criminal gangs coming into stores and stealing high valued goods and then reselling them, which is like a “new trend”. Another issue retailers are facing is pinning down a typical shoplifter. Condradie said that she doesn’t think the police are responding well enough to these incidents. Because of this many retailers don’t think that the police generally respond well, it leaves them reluctant to report incidents in the first place. And since retailers are reporting incidents police aren’t able to take action. “It kind of becomes a vicious cycle. So retailers need to ensure that they are reporting all incidents, and then the police need to make sure they are attending all incidents, because a lot of thieves just don’t think there’s going to be any consequences for actions and that the police likely won’t turn up.”

According to YouGov’s recent data, stealing from shops is equally common among both genders and across social grades. But a closer look reveals that women and men tend to pilfer for different reasons – and so do people in ABC1 and C2DE occupations. It also revealed that one in 20 Brits (5%) have shoplifted as an adult, and 23% nicked an item as a child. The report also claimed that young generations have softer views on shoplifting. According to the report Two in five 18- to 24-year-olds say it’s sometimes okay, in contrast to only 12% of people aged 55 or older.

People who think shoplifting can be excusable overwhelmingly say it’s acceptable if you’re starving (88%), while 40% think it’s okay if you’re poor. Stealing from a large business is viewed as more acceptable (16%) than from a small or independent shop (1%). And only 2% think a long queue is a valid excuse.

On asking Conradie whether the store layout or the upkeep of the store plays a role in safeguarding the stores from shoplifting, she says that these thefts are becoming more bold and are not really deterred by the store layout. “When there’s a different store layout, maybe for something more like petty theft, it might make a bit of a difference. But for these big sort of gang storming stores, I don’t think it makes a difference to I think they’re going to do it no matter what,” she said. However, some suggest that if you can change the layout of your retail store, it will make it harder for shoplifters to get away with stealing. For instance, doing things like placing the cash register by the door to force customers to walk past you when leaving, minimising blind spots by moving displays, installing better lighting and placing mirrors around the store and removing tall displays to see customers throughout the store can help reduce cases of shoplifting.

Juniper stated that John Lewis has a zero tolerance policy to crime and it has rolled out extra measures to tackle it and keep its people safe. For example, it has increased the number of guards in its stores, and improved its CCTV – including the roll out of body-worn cameras across our shops. It has also rolled out other initiatives to deter theft. While some of these need to be kept covert, others include:

Increasing the number of security teams in our branches (both Waitrose and John Lewis)
Training our Partners on ‘love bombing’ – where we deter would-be shoplifters through friendly, attentive customer service

We’re soon to be offering all Partners voluntary de-escalation training, which aims to help predict when a situation may intensify and how to deal with it

Introducing body-worn CCTV cameras across our estate. These are available to a range of Partners across Waitrose and John Lewis shops, including duty managers, guards and loss prevention Partners. Not only do these help deter would-be shoplifters and defuse potentially difficult situations (keeping Partners safe), in instances where crimes do occur, they give us solid evidence to share with local police forces and help drive prosecutions
Offering free hot drinks to local police forces, available in both Waitrose and John Lewis stores, as part of efforts to strengthen relationships and tackle retail crime.

Juniper also said that since the pandemic, we’ve also seen a rise in aggression towards its partners: “During the pandemic, retail workers were applauded for working on the front-lines, now they’re being threatened at work. It’s completely unacceptable; nobody should be treated like that at work, especially in a career like retail. There’s a common myth that retailers aren’t able to stop shoplifters. While we never want our partners to put themselves in danger, we’ve upped our security staff across John Lewis and Waitrose – including those who are specially trained to detain offenders.”

In conclusion, it is evident that thieves have developed a wide range of distinct shoplifting methods. These include hiding, using jammers, and label switching; criminals undoubtedly have plenty of creative ideas. They also suggest to Work out where inside the store thefts are happening, Tag your items with ‘Electronic Article Surveillance’, keep the store tidy and try and no be alone as much as possible.