Shoplifting Facts

1. Shrink represents 1.34 percent of annual retail sales.
2. In all its forms, shrink represents a “tax” on consumers.
3. The highest theft rates of merchandise occur with popular new products, across a wide variety of price ranges.
4. More than 5 million thieves—both store visitors and employees—were apprehended
5. Much of retailers’ merchandise is still unprotected.
6. Spending on global loss prevention systems now exceeds $25 billion.
7. The most-stolen items remain strikingly consistent from year to year, and across geographies.
8. Customer theft remains the number-one source of shrink globally, especially in Europe and Asia- Pacific.
9. Don’t overlook simple administrative waste and internal errors as causes of shrink.
10. Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS) is the main method of protecting stores against losses.

As retailers continue to deal with the consequences of a global recession, they are facing decisions that will have major implications for their long-term futures.

Chief among those is finding the best ways to protect their businesses from a decline in revenues, while maintaining their day-to-day operations and fulfilling their strategic goals. Aside from sustaining revenues through more competitive pricing for consumers, retailers are looking to make adjustments in their operational budgets in various part of their business.

Among these, inevitably, is loss prevention. However, cutting loss prevention spending at a time when potential crime is rising is not the answer – particularly if the losses from higher shrink and out-of-stocks prove to be much greater than the gains from reduced loss prevention budgets.