Stop shoplifting-3 WC Blog 656
Electronic Article Surveillance-4
Sensormatic Labels-3
Group Theft Can Be Prevented With The Help Of Sensormatic Labels
I remember the days when I was a Loss Prevention Officer and had to make choices on how to stop shoplifting by a group that was working together. The decisions were never easy. I had to consider if I had a partner working with me or was I alone that shift. If I was alone, did I have a manager working on whom I could depend to at least call the police for me or did I have a less than reliable manager on duty? If I was working alone I had to decide how I was going to approach the group when I was ready to stop them. These may not seem like hard choices but there were all kinds of consequences and unforeseen outcomes that could occur if I was not careful. In fact when watching a group I even had to decide who the main actor was and determine if THAT was going to be the one to maintain surveillance on. Once concealment began I had to stick with one person to watch especially if the group split up. When it comes to Retail Loss Prevention store owners have choices to make also and they aren’t always easy.
Do you, the store owner have a Loss Prevention program in place? Is it effective and what does it consist of in terms of people, equipment, theft deterrence, etc.? Who in your store knows your plan or what their role if any is to stop shoplifting? Allow me to pause for a moment and say this if you don’t have an electronic article surveillance system as part of your anti-theft strategy you need one (another choice to make, right?). Most people are familiar with these systems so I won’t belabor that point. What I will comment on is there are a number of systems on the market and finding one that is effective and has a variety of tags and labels available is important. Sensormatic labels and tags along with their electronic article surveillance towers fits that bill. They offer both radio frequency labels and acoustic magnetic tags that protect a wide range of merchandise and packaging materials. As someone who has tagged more items than he cares to remember I can vouch for the fact that having multiple tags and styles is vital for an effective security plan. Different products have different security needs and one size does not fit all. I’m going to tag a package of gum with a different device than a pair of shoes.
More likely than not, there is a store manager reading this who is thinking that they don’t need an electronic article surveillance system. They feel that their employees offer customer service and that is enough to prevent theft. As someone who has been in Loss Prevention for many years I am going to say that train of thought is flawed. The groups I was dealing with were astute in how they would commit their crimes. If they noticed that employees were providing customer service they would split up. Divide the store team and someone is going to get free to conceal merchandise. It was hard in a big box store to cover everyone, for a small or medium size retailer you will probably not have the personnel to match up one for one. Once your team is divided your store becomes free game. A force multiplier for YOU is to use Sensormatic labels to protect your merchandise and the towers at the front doors to alarm if a criminal tries to sneak goods out of the store.
In the department store I worked for as a Loss Prevention Officer we had multiple exits, I could never cover them all on my own or with a partner. BUT in the big box stores I worked for we had one entry/exit point and a single employee could respond to an electronic article surveillance alarm quickly and effectively. In a store with this equipment set up your team can offer the best customer service possible to deter shoplifters. But tagging merchandise and having one person near the front doors able to answer alarms means you don’t have to be concerned if you can’t keep up with every member of a suspicious party of customers.
You have decisions to make on how to stop shoplifting in your store(s) to stay profitable. With so many day to day managerial responsibilities to attend to this doesn’t need to be a difficult one to make. Tag merchandise with Sensormatic labels and add Sensormatic towers at your entrances and exits and you will see an immediate impact on theft reduction in your store. Multiply the impact of your customer service with Sensormatic.
Sensormatic labels are important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
I remember the days when I was a Loss Prevention Officer and had to make choices on how to stop shoplifting by a group that was working together. The decisions were never easy. I had to consider if I had a partner working with me or was I alone that shift. If I was alone, did I have a manager working on whom I could depend to at least call the police for me or did I have a less than reliable manager on duty? If I was working alone I had to decide how I was going to approach the group when I was ready to stop them. These may not seem like hard choices but there were all kinds of consequences and unforeseen outcomes that could occur if I was not careful. In fact when watching a group I even had to decide who the main actor was and determine if THAT was going to be the one to maintain surveillance on. Once concealment began I had to stick with one person to watch especially if the group split up. When it comes to Retail Loss Prevention store owners have choices to make also and they aren’t always easy.
Do you, the store owner have a Loss Prevention program in place? Is it effective and what does it consist of in terms of people, equipment, theft deterrence, etc.? Who in your store knows your plan or what their role if any is to stop shoplifting? Allow me to pause for a moment and say this if you don’t have an electronic article surveillance system as part of your anti-theft strategy you need one (another choice to make, right?). Most people are familiar with these systems so I won’t belabor that point. What I will comment on is there are a number of systems on the market and finding one that is effective and has a variety of tags and labels available is important. Sensormatic labels and tags along with their electronic article surveillance towers fits that bill. They offer both radio frequency labels and acoustic magnetic tags that protect a wide range of merchandise and packaging materials. As someone who has tagged more items than he cares to remember I can vouch for the fact that having multiple tags and styles is vital for an effective security plan. Different products have different security needs and one size does not fit all. I’m going to tag a package of gum with a different device than a pair of shoes.
More likely than not, there is a store manager reading this who is thinking that they don’t need an electronic article surveillance system. They feel that their employees offer customer service and that is enough to prevent theft. As someone who has been in Loss Prevention for many years I am going to say that train of thought is flawed. The groups I was dealing with were astute in how they would commit their crimes. If they noticed that employees were providing customer service they would split up. Divide the store team and someone is going to get free to conceal merchandise. It was hard in a big box store to cover everyone, for a small or medium size retailer you will probably not have the personnel to match up one for one. Once your team is divided your store becomes free game. A force multiplier for YOU is to use Sensormatic labels to protect your merchandise and the towers at the front doors to alarm if a criminal tries to sneak goods out of the store.
In the department store I worked for as a Loss Prevention Officer we had multiple exits, I could never cover them all on my own or with a partner. BUT in the big box stores I worked for we had one entry/exit point and a single employee could respond to an electronic article surveillance alarm quickly and effectively. In a store with this equipment set up your team can offer the best customer service possible to deter shoplifters. But tagging merchandise and having one person near the front doors able to answer alarms means you don’t have to be concerned if you can’t keep up with every member of a suspicious party of customers.
You have decisions to make on how to stop shoplifting in your store(s) to stay profitable. With so many day to day managerial responsibilities to attend to this doesn’t need to be a difficult one to make. Tag merchandise with Sensormatic labels and add Sensormatic towers at your entrances and exits and you will see an immediate impact on theft reduction in your store. Multiply the impact of your customer service with Sensormatic.
Sensormatic labels are important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
People Counting Systems-4 WC Blog 537
Customer Counting Device-5
People Counting Systems Can Help Safety Results
People counting systems assist stores in delivering improved sales results but there is another application that may be overlooked and can improve store safety and impact profitability. There can be areas in a store that may not receive as much foot traffic as other areas of a building. I harken back to my days as a Manager On Duty. I would walk the store checking on endcaps, merchandise presentation, full shelves, etc. My walks would include the entire store but it was evident from the presentation of merchandise in a few sections that not many customers walked by these areas. This would also indicate to me that there probably were not too many managers walking through those areas either. If an area is out of sight it is out of mind and so if there happen to be any safety issues in that department they could easily be overlooked by employees. A customer counting device can be set up in areas that seem to be off the beaten path in order to determine what the actual traffic counts are for that area of the store.
It is appropriate at this point to talk about what people counting systems are and how they work. Counting systems measure the number of people who pass by a device. Often the devices are attached to an entrance door. The data from a Checkpoint Visiplus System includes day and hourly information that owners and supervisors can use to help manage the business. Visiplus can also be attached to a Checkpoint tower and benefit stores in evaluating electronic article system alarms and responses. In these stores the customer counting device is helping to measure data that is useful in increasing sales as well as data that can help reduce shortage. If there is a need for it a device can be set up in a location within a store to track customer traffic. This is where a unit may be helpful in locating potential points where safety could be a concern for owners and managers.
When I was a Loss Prevention Manager I had several incidents of purse snatchings take place in my store. The customer left a purse or tote bag in a shopping cart and walked several feet away. The perpetrator would see the exposed bag and walk by, pick up the purse and walk away. Often the incidents took place in areas of the store where there was less patron activity. This meant there was minimal risk that a witness would be in the area who would see the crime take place. Knowing where these low activity areas were by analyzing the information from a customer counting device might have been useful. We could have alerted our other managers that this was an area they should frequent during the shift. An alternative would have been to send employees to walk through known low traffic areas as a deterrent to potential crime.
Another way the customer counting device can improve safety is that by identifying those low traffic areas your team may do more walk-throughs and find a safety concern that could be overlooked. The safety issues I am thinking of are spills that are not cleaned up leading to slip and fall accidents. They are broken floor tile or carpet that is in poor condition that could pose trip hazards. All it takes is for one customer to have an accident because something is not done to correct a safety problem and you are shelling out big money for a claim.
You should also note that if you can identify low traffic areas by using people counting systems you can try to find ways to direct more customer flow in that direction. It could be the use of signing to direct shoppers to a new display in those areas. Maybe moving popular categories of merchandise to those locations is a means to entice customers in that direction. Knowing what the actual patron foot print is in those areas means you can proactively address the issue of slow turnover merchandise.
Loss Prevention Systems Inc. recognizes the importance of store safety to the bottom line of retail businesses. They can help reduce risk in your establishment and improve sales with the purchase of a customer counting device. Install people counting systems and plan for decreased safety issues and increased profits.
For more information about people counting systems contact us or call 1.770.426.0547.
People counting systems assist stores in delivering improved sales results but there is another application that may be overlooked and can improve store safety and impact profitability. There can be areas in a store that may not receive as much foot traffic as other areas of a building. I harken back to my days as a Manager On Duty. I would walk the store checking on endcaps, merchandise presentation, full shelves, etc. My walks would include the entire store but it was evident from the presentation of merchandise in a few sections that not many customers walked by these areas. This would also indicate to me that there probably were not too many managers walking through those areas either. If an area is out of sight it is out of mind and so if there happen to be any safety issues in that department they could easily be overlooked by employees. A customer counting device can be set up in areas that seem to be off the beaten path in order to determine what the actual traffic counts are for that area of the store.
It is appropriate at this point to talk about what people counting systems are and how they work. Counting systems measure the number of people who pass by a device. Often the devices are attached to an entrance door. The data from a people counter includes day and hourly information that owners and supervisors can use to help manage the business. Visiplus can also be attached to an EAS tower and benefit stores in evaluating electronic article system alarms and responses. In these stores the customer counting device is helping to measure data that is useful in increasing sales as well as data that can help reduce shortage. If there is a need for it a device can be set up in a location within a store to track customer traffic. This is where a unit may be helpful in locating potential points where safety could be a concern for owners and managers.
When I was a Loss Prevention Manager I had several incidents of purse snatchings take place in my store. The customer left a purse or tote bag in a shopping cart and walked several feet away. The perpetrator would see the exposed bag and walk by, pick up the purse and walk away. Often the incidents took place in areas of the store where there was less patron activity. This meant there was minimal risk that a witness would be in the area who would see the crime take place. Knowing where these low activity areas were by analyzing the information from a customer counting device might have been useful. We could have alerted our other managers that this was an area they should frequent during the shift. An alternative would have been to send employees to walk through known low traffic areas as a deterrent to potential crime.
Another way the customer counting device can improve safety is that by identifying those low traffic areas your team may do more walk-throughs and find a safety concern that could be overlooked. The safety issues I am thinking of are spills that are not cleaned up leading to slip and fall accidents. They are broken floor tile or carpet that is in poor condition that could pose trip hazards. All it takes is for one customer to have an accident because something is not done to correct a safety problem and you are shelling out big money for a claim.
You should also note that if you can identify low traffic areas by using people counting systems you can try to find ways to direct more customer flow in that direction. It could be the use of signing to direct shoppers to a new display in those areas. Maybe moving popular categories of merchandise to those locations is a means to entice customers in that direction. Knowing what the actual patron foot print is in those areas means you can proactively address the issue of slow turnover merchandise.
Loss Prevention Systems Inc. recognizes the importance of store safety to the bottom line of retail businesses. They can help reduce risk in your establishment and improve sales with the purchase of a customer counting device. Install people counting systems and plan for decreased safety issues and increased profits
.For more information about people counting systems, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547.
Clothing security-3 WC Blog 579
Checkpoint Tags-3
Shrinking Clothing Shortage With Checkpoint Tags
Sometimes we need facts and statistics to help us understand why something needs to be treated with importance and clothing security is no different. If you are a retail owner selling any type of clothing lines you should find the following statistics from the 2017 National Retail Federation’s National Retail Security Survey interesting and disturbing:
• Inventory shrink for the apparel sector grew from 1.2% in 2016 to 1.36% in 2017 (pg.8)
• 15 of 26 apparel respondents to the survey said shrink had grown in their stores (pg.8)
• In apparel, both shoplifting (41%) and employee theft (35.5%) were higher than the overall average for retailers (pg. 8)
• In apparel only 4 of 22 respondents expect to have a higher LP budget in 2017 while 9 expect flat budgets and 2 expect lower budgets (pg. 9)
• Apparel had an average loss of $1,132 per dishonest employee (pg. 14)
• The average shoplifting incident in apparel was $974.37 (pg. 15)
• In apparel the average cost of return fraud was $968.81 (pg. 16)
Apparel retailers appear to be getting hammered from all sides when the numbers are examined. Inventory shrink is growing, shoplifting and employee theft are both increasing and it appears Loss Prevention budgets are staying flat or decreasing. The survey was taken using retail LP professionals, which means these were stores that are large enough to have an LP department of some type. Loss Prevention Systems Inc. founder and CEO Bill Bregar is concerned by theft in all retail locations but his company especially focuses on providing services to the small retail businesses. The national apparel chain stores are struggling with clothing security. How much more is the little guy which cannot afford a security staff? Bill suggests ALL retailers use Checkpoint tags on the clothes they sell, including the little guy.
Checkpoint tags and Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS) pedestals are part of a larger system designed to discourage shoplifting and employee theft. The tags pin to the garment and can only be removed with a special detachment tool controlled by the store. Tags have integrated coils that continuously send out radio frequency (rf) waves. Merchandise that is tagged is picked up by the pedestals acting as rf receivers. Walk out with goods protected by a tag and the pedestal alarm blasts out an alert that can be heard throughout the largest stores. Shoplifters enter a store with a pedestal and they become much more cautious knowing they may set off an alarm if they steal. The thief looks at merchandise and sees everything has a Checkpoint tag and they usually make the choice to leave the store alone. For the foolhardy criminal who chooses to test the system, they set off the alarm when they walk up with tagged products. Often the result is dropped merchandise but when it isn’t, a quick response from trained employees is enough to conduct receipt checks and merchandise is retrieved. Though I have referenced shoplifters, employees who may consider stealing face the same obstacles if they make a decision to take something without paying. EAS makes no distinction between a crooked employee and a crooked customer.
So you may be wondering if a store that has an EAS system must also have security staff to answer alarms. The answer is no. I was a Loss Prevention Manager for a company that had numerous changes to our security teams. Sometimes I had a budget that allowed me ample people to staff the front of the store and to walk the floor seeking out shoplifters. At other times, I had little or no budget for a person to staff the front end. I always had to train store employees, usually cashiers and front-end supervisors to be prepared to respond to alarms. They were not apprehending anyone they were just trained to conduct thorough receipt and package checks. They resolved alarm activations caused by clothing security tags or other retail anti-theft devices. With training, employees who are not Loss Prevention Specialists are quite capable of handling an alarm and recovering unpaid merchandise. You don’t have to have an Loss Prevention staff to have an effective Checkpoint System.
Shoplifting and employee theft do not seem to be going away. Retail shrink, especially in the apparel sector continues to climb at a higher rate than that of other retail markets. If national chain stores continue to experience such losses then you can be sure your business will be impacted as well. Use Checkpoint tags on your clothing goods and add Checkpoint towers at your entry and exit doors and you will dramatically reduce theft in your store. The result will be declining shortage and that means more profit for your business.
Clothing security is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
Sometimes we need facts and statistics to help us understand why something needs to be treated with importance and clothing security is no different. If you are a retail owner selling any type of clothing lines you should find the following statistics from the 2017 National Retail Federation’s National Retail Security Survey interesting and disturbing:
• Inventory shrink for the apparel sector grew from 1.2% in 2016 to 1.36% in 2017 (pg.8)
• 15 of 26 apparel respondents to the survey said shrink had grown in their stores (pg.8)
• In apparel, both shoplifting (41%) and employee theft (35.5%) were higher than the overall average for retailers (pg. 8)
• In apparel only 4 of 22 respondents expect to have a higher LP budget in 2017 while 9 expect flat budgets and 2 expect lower budgets (pg. 9)
• Apparel had an average loss of $1,132 per dishonest employee (pg. 14)
• The average shoplifting incident in apparel was $974.37 (pg. 15)
• In apparel the average cost of return fraud was $968.81 (pg. 16)
Apparel retailers appear to be getting hammered from all sides when the numbers are examined. Inventory shrink is growing, shoplifting and employee theft are both increasing and it appears Loss Prevention budgets are staying flat or decreasing. The survey was taken using retail LP professionals, which means these were stores that are large enough to have an LP department of some type. Loss Prevention Systems Inc. founder and CEO Bill Bregar is concerned by theft in all retail locations but his company especially focuses on providing services to the small retail businesses. The national apparel chain stores are struggling with clothing security. How much more is the little guy which cannot afford a security staff? Bill suggests ALL retailers use clothing tags on the clothes they sell, including the little guy.
Clothing tags and Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS) pedestals are part of a larger system designed to discourage shoplifting and employee theft. The tags pin to the garment and can only be removed with a special detachment tool controlled by the store. Tags have integrated coils that continuously send out radio frequency (rf) waves. Merchandise that is tagged is picked up by the pedestals acting as rf receivers. Walk out with goods protected by a tag and the pedestal alarm blasts out an alert that can be heard throughout the largest stores. Shoplifters enter a store with a pedestal and they become much more cautious knowing they may set off an alarm if they steal. The thief looks at merchandise and sees everything has a hard tag and they usually make the choice to leave the store alone. For the foolhardy criminal who chooses to test the system, they set off the alarm when they walk up with tagged products. Often the result is dropped merchandise but when it isn’t, a quick response from trained employees is enough to conduct receipt checks and merchandise is retrieved. Though I have referenced shoplifters, employees who may consider stealing face the same obstacles if they make a decision to take something without paying. EAS makes no distinction between a crooked employee and a crooked customer.
So you may be wondering if a store that has an EAS system must also have security staff to answer alarms. The answer is no. I was a Loss Prevention Manager for a company that had numerous changes to our security teams. Sometimes I had a budget that allowed me ample people to staff the front of the store and to walk the floor seeking out shoplifters. At other times, I had little or no budget for a person to staff the front end. I always had to train store employees, usually cashiers and front-end supervisors to be prepared to respond to alarms. They were not apprehending anyone they were just trained to conduct thorough receipt and package checks. They resolved alarm activations caused by clothing security tags or other retail anti-theft devices. With training, employees who are not Loss Prevention Specialists are quite capable of handling an alarm and recovering unpaid merchandise. You don’t have to have an Loss Prevention staff to have an effective EAS System.
Shoplifting and employee theft do not seem to be going away. Retail shrink, especially in the apparel sector continues to climb at a higher rate than that of other retail markets. If national chain stores continue to experience such losses then you can be sure your business will be impacted as well. Use clothing tags on your clothing goods and add EAS towers at your entry and exit doors and you will dramatically reduce theft in your store. The result will be declining shortage and that means more profit for your business.
Clothing security is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
Loss Prevention Calculator-3 WC Blog 573
Can Loss Prevention Be Free?-3
Rethinking Loss Prevention With The Loss Prevention Calculator
In the Retail Loss Prevention field we are constantly looking at return on investment. We look at equipment costs, the investment of time to do certain tasks and investment in people. We analyze information and I think how convenient it would be to have a Loss Prevention Calculator that could do all the number crunching for us. While we look at the information with the thought, “What will this investment save us in the long term?” rarely do we think in terms of can Loss Prevention Be Free? We just aren’t trained to think like that. We talk about shortage reduction but it is almost unheard of to speak in absolutes in Loss Prevention like talking about shortage elimination. Sometimes the problem is not with what we are discussing it is how we are asking the questions. We have to rethink how we are problem solving. I will give you a perfect example. Bill Bregar, the CEO of Loss Prevention Systems Inc. comes from an extensive background in the Retail Loss Prevention field. He has dealt with the same issues the rest of us have dealt with and many of us have years and years of Loss Prevention experience like Bill does. What Bill has done is rephrased a question we all ask but the answer reveals a better way of thinking about a problem. That problem is the cost of a Loss Prevention System for a store.
Before I go on it is a good time to remember that there are some readers who are not as familiar with what a Loss Prevention System is. A system is an electronic article surveillance package consisting of towers, tags, specialty detachment keys and/or deactivation pads. The system works by deterrence and recovery of merchandise through receipt checks initiated due to alarm activations. Tags are constantly transmitting radio frequency waves and when a crook tries to leave with a tagged item the towers sense that wave and alarms are triggered in the towers. Store associates quickly respond, check the “customer’s” receipt and recover the unpaid goods. Frequently those persons who intend to shoplift have a change of heart when they see the towers at the doors to the store or when they find they cannot get a tag off of an item. The value of the system is clear to store owners when they see the shelves remaining full and the number of count adjustments greatly reduced.
Returning to my original point about how the rephrasing of a question changes the way we evaluate something. When I was a Loss Prevention Manager, if I asked for an additional closed circuit camera I might get a question in response. Like, “How many internals will you get with it?” Of course there really was no real answer I could give. I couldn’t guarantee how many people I would catch with the new camera. In hindsight it might have been better if we would have changed the nature of the questions. Like turning the idea of a Loss Prevention System from a liability and asking, “How much will it cost and will it really reduce theft?” to asking, “Can Loss Prevention Be Free?” The question implies there will be a tangible payoff. I should have said I could promise a new camera would give a return of investment in less merchandise shrinkage.
The Loss Prevention Calculator is a tool that Loss Prevention Systems Inc. has developed to help managers see in real numbers how much a Checkpoint System can save them in reduced theft. After a few numbers are plugged in a result give the estimated number of months it will take for the system to pay for itself through the reduced amount of shortage it will save. The question, “How much will a retail anti-theft system cost me?” now becomes, “How many months will a new Checkpoint System take to pay for itself” What if we looked at ALL Loss Prevention purchases in this manner? It is certainly a new spin on things.
“Can Loss Prevention be free?” it absolutely can be. Certainly a purchase will have to be made and tagging will have to be done but after that it is a matter of maintenance and an ongoing tagging program. Keep in mind that once a Checkpoint system has paid for itself the continued savings are able to be reinvested or added to the bottom line. No matter how you slice it a system can be free and the Loss Prevention Calculator is the vehicle to show you how.
Get more information on the Free Loss Prevention Calculator, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 today.
You’ve heard the term “you should invest in your people” but have you ever considered that there can be a
In the Retail Loss Prevention field we are constantly looking at return on investment. We look at equipment costs, the investment of time to do certain tasks and investment in people. We analyze information and I think how convenient it would be to have a Loss Prevention Calculator that could do all the number crunching for us. While we look at the information with the thought, “What will this investment save us in the long term?” rarely do we think in terms of can Loss Prevention Be Free? We just aren’t trained to think like that. We talk about shortage reduction but it is almost unheard of to speak in absolutes in Loss Prevention like talking about shortage elimination. Sometimes the problem is not with what we are discussing it is how we are asking the questions. We have to rethink how we are problem solving. I will give you a perfect example. Bill Bregar, the CEO of Loss Prevention Systems Inc. comes from an extensive background in the Retail Loss Prevention field. He has dealt with the same issues the rest of us have dealt with and many of us have years and years of Loss Prevention experience like Bill does. What Bill has done is rephrased a question we all ask but the answer reveals a better way of thinking about a problem. That problem is the cost of a Loss Prevention System for a store.
Before I go on it is a good time to remember that there are some readers who are not as familiar with what a Loss Prevention System is. A system is an electronic article surveillance package consisting of towers, tags, specialty detachment keys and/or deactivation pads. The system works by deterrence and recovery of merchandise through receipt checks initiated due to alarm activations. Tags are constantly transmitting radio frequency waves and when a crook tries to leave with a tagged item the towers sense that wave and alarms are triggered in the towers. Store associates quickly respond, check the “customer’s” receipt and recover the unpaid goods. Frequently those persons who intend to shoplift have a change of heart when they see the towers at the doors to the store or when they find they cannot get a tag off of an item. The value of the system is clear to store owners when they see the shelves remaining full and the number of count adjustments greatly reduced.
Returning to my original point about how the rephrasing of a question changes the way we evaluate something. When I was a Loss Prevention Manager, if I asked for an additional closed circuit camera I might get a question in response. Like, “How many internals will you get with it?” Of course there really was no real answer I could give. I couldn’t guarantee how many people I would catch with the new camera. In hindsight it might have been better if we would have changed the nature of the questions. Like turning the idea of a Loss Prevention System from a liability and asking, “How much will it cost and will it really reduce theft?” to asking, “Can Loss Prevention Be Free?” The question implies there will be a tangible payoff. I should have said I could promise a new camera would give a return of investment in less merchandise shrinkage.
The Loss Prevention Calculator is a tool that Loss Prevention Systems Inc. has developed to help managers see in real numbers how much an EAS System can save them in reduced theft. After a few numbers are plugged in a result give the estimated number of months it will take for the system to pay for itself through the reduced amount of shortage it will save. The question, “How much will a retail anti-theft system cost me?” now becomes, “How many months will a new EAS System take to pay for itself” What if we looked at ALL Loss Prevention purchases in this manner? It is certainly a new spin on things.
“Can Loss Prevention be free?” it absolutely can be. Certainly a purchase will have to be made and tagging will have to be done but after that it is a matter of maintenance and an ongoing tagging program. Keep in mind that once an EAS system has paid for itself the continued savings are able to be reinvested or added to the bottom line. No matter how you slice it a system can be free and the Loss Prevention Calculator is the vehicle to show you how.
Get more information on the Free Loss Prevention Calculator, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 today.
I worked in Retail Loss Prevention for many years and during that time I had a lot of opportunities to stop shoplifting as the result of an electronic article surveillance alarm set off by a tagged piece of merchandise. Today I work in a library but still deal with alarms when patrons set them off as they exit or enter our building. The alarms are sometimes caused by items that are tagged but the tags have not been properly deactivated. In other cases it is the result of someone trying to sneak library materials out in order to steal them (sounds a lot like shoplifting doesn’t it?). It is necessary to investigate and resolve the source of any alarm until it is satisfactorily resolved. Just a few days ago a student was leaving the building and as she walked through our towers the alarm sounded. I used my Loss Prevention experience to stop the patron and talk to her about what may have caused the activation.
Whether it is a college library or a store, electronic article surveillance labels can prevent merchandise and property from being improperly removed from a building. In the case of a retail business those labels can make the difference between a profitable and successful enterprise and one that struggles. Sensormatic labels can prevent thieves from stealing but even with a system as good as Sensormatic’s a store must have employees available to respond to alarms. Those employees must also have the proper training to approach shoppers who set off alarms and the know how to resolve the alarms. It is not as easy as it may sound. I would like to offer some tips from my own experience so you can train your employees to identify what has set off an electronic article surveillance alarm system.
• An employee who approaches a customer that has set off an alarm should never begin the interaction assuming the customer was trying to steal something. The attitude exhibited by the employee influences the way the customer will respond. I have found that by making a statement that indicates a mistake happened rather than an attempted theft can calm a patron almost immediately. I will say something like, “Uh-oh, our system must not have deactivated a tag properly, I’m sorry.”
• I then begin the process of determining the cause of the alarm. In a store I will ask if the patron has made a purchase. If they say they did I ask if they could show me a receipt? If the patron said they bought something but they don’t have the receipt I ask if I can look in their bag. I follow up by asking what register they went through and after reviewing the transactions if I cannot locate the item I tell the customer we must have accidentally missed the item as we were scanning. No, I’m not throwing the cashier under the bus, I am giving the person an “out” so it does not appear I am accusing them of theft.
• If a look through a shopping bag does not reveal the cause of the alarm a bit if finesse will be required. You may have to try to get a peak in a purse, backpack or tote and that can be more difficult. People don’t like to have their personal belongings rummaged through. I like to say something that will make the person feel like I am helping them. If they have multiple bags I will suggest they walk one bag through the tower at a time. Through the process of elimination I find the bag that has the active tag in it. I then diffuse the situation further. I mention that I have had customers forget and put an item in a purse to see if it would fit (such as a wallet) and forget they put it in. Again, providing a ready-made excuse for the customer makes it easier to get an item back or the person to pay for it, I have encountered both. I also tell customers that sometimes people make purchases at other stores with electronic article surveillance systems and they fail to deactivate tags and it can set off our system.
A skilled employee who has been trained can stop shoplifting and even prevent unintentional missed merchandise from leaving the store.
If you don’t currently have a Sensormatic system in your store I strongly encourage you to get one. You will stop shoplifting and as you do you will see your instocks improve. THAT drives sales and profits. As evidence that my tips work, in the case of the library alarm, the student had two books in her backpack that she had forgotten about. I got them checked out and the student went on her way.
Need more information on electronic article surveillance, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 today.
