November 14, 2024
©vladimirsukhachev via Canva.com
The Hassle of Locked-Up Merchandise
A recent survey from Numerator found that 27% of shoppers will switch retailers or abandon the purchase when they see products under lock and key.
Reports started arriving in early 2022 of drug, consumer electronics, home improvement, grocery, and mass merchandiser chains locking up products behind plexiglass or even freezer cases as store theft rates remained elevated from pre-pandemic levels.
The Numerator survey of over 5,000 consumers taken in September found that 61% of shoppers reported seeing an increase in the number of products under lock and key over the last year. To many, the surprise has been seeing deodorant, toothpaste, shampoo, cosmetics, and other everyday essentials locked up on shelves behind display cases.
The Numerator survey found the most commonly observed locked-up items to be personal electronics (58% of consumers report seeing), OTC medications (38%), physical media (36%), personal hygiene products (34%), makeup and cosmetics (33%), large electronics (32%), and accessories (29%).
Of those surveyed, 62% said they typically wait for assistance when they encounter locked-up merchandise, with 9% saying they order the item online from that same retailer. However, 17% will switch retailers, and 10% will abandon the purchase altogether.
Numerator also found that shoppers are less willing to wait when everyday goods are locked up. Only 53% are willing to wait for assistance if bath and body products are locked up, 56% for makeup and cosmetics, and 57% for personal hygiene products.
Retailers locking up merchandise indicate that it’s a last resort effort to reduce shrink. Dollar Tree’s CFO Jeff Davis said last year on a quarterly analyst call as the discount chain began locking up products, “We don’t particularly care for it because we know that impacts sales.”
Store associates face the wrath of customers annoyed at having to wait for their products to be unlocked. A supervisor at a Vons in Pasadena, California, recently told the Los Angeles Times, “I apologize a lot and I get yelled at a lot.”
A survey last year from WSL Strategic Retail similarly found that 22% of shoppers either changed products or skipped the purchase because the item they wanted was locked up.
WSL’s advice to avoid frustrating shoppers when a product needs to be locked up includes:
- Staff the store to unlock sales: Shoppers are more likely to ask for help if they can see nearby workers who are clearly assigned to do so.
- Alert shoppers in advance: If retailers take the surprise out of lockups through in-store and online messaging, shoppers can factor the disruption into their trips. Messaging could also explain the effects of theft and include alternate purchase options, such as buying online or BOPIS.
- Post online purchase options at the store level: Consumers might choose to order a locked-up product online if a QR code or the store’s website is posted on the case.
Walmart is exploring a technology that lets shoppers provide their mobile phone numbers to receive a code to unlock merchandise on shelves, according to a new Bloomberg report. Kroger, Lowe’s, and Safeway have also introduced similar technology, although some find having to provide a phone number “invasive.”
Andy Jassy, Amazon’s president and CEO, believes the in-store anti-theft moves are boosting Amazon’s pharmacy business. He said on his company’s second-quarter analyst call, “If you walk into pharmacies in cities today, it’s a pretty tough experience with how much is locked behind cabinets.”
BrainTrust
Perry Kramer
Managing Partner, Retail Consulting Partners
David Biernbaum
Founder & President, David Biernbaum & Associates LLC
Bob Amster
Principal, Retail Technology Group
Recent Discussions
Discussion Questions
What solutions do you see to reducing shopper frustrations when products need to be locked up due to high shrink?
Do any technology solutions appear viable?
Poll
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Locking up merchandise creates a terrible customer experience, it increases the workload for staff, it deters customers from buying, and so forth. However, there is also a material cost that can be measured in dollars and cents. Our research estimates that across the first half of this year, retailers lost $338 million in sales because of locking things away. Most of these sales do not disappear entirely – especially for essentials items like laundry detergent or toothpaste – shoppers simply go elsewhere. From our estimates the main beneficiary, picking up almost 58% of the lost sales, is Amazon.
The real solution is not to lock things away. Failing that, allowing customers to unlock cabinets themselves – using smartphones linked to membership of loyalty programs, for example – is a way of mitigating (though not entirely solving) the issue.
The number of retail crimes is out of control, and store managers and executives are looking for answers, but lock and key creates more problems than what it resolves.
Progressive politicians need to understand that police need to be fully funded and staffed, and that they must be allowed to enforce laws as fully as possible, but I won’t hold my breath.
Consumers are turned off by lock and key. It destroys impulse shopping. It is rare for stores to have enough personnel to assist customers quickly, if even at all. Making comparisons and reading packages is difficult for consumers.
It is important for retailers to get their merchandise back on the shelves. A certain price point is “ok” to lock up merchandise. Any item under $50 should be readable, touchable, and consumable without the assistance of store employees.
Another conflict of interest exists. Companies are being forced to ditch boxes and design products, especially bottles, to stand on shelves without boxes. Boxes make theft more difficult.
During the NACDS Annual Meeting this past Spring, I spoke with several top executives. In summary, most consider this the most pressing problem they face. Local governments, especially in urban areas, seem to deny or underestimate the rampant theft problem, especially from masked gangs, according to CEOs.
To enforce the need for fully staffed police departments with cops allowed to do their jobs, retail executives must meet with mayors personally.
Hi David. Can you please provide some data that “the number of retail crimes is out of control?” I haven’t seen any.
thanks!
What solutions do you see to reducing shopper frustrations when products need to be locked up due to high shrink?
> None
Do any technology solutions appear viable?
>Such as? This is 435% an issue of cost effectiveness: if the margin on an item is low AND safeguading it requires labor intensive security methods, it’s unlikely that selling it will remain viable.
My final thought: I’d love to be a fly-on-the-wall when these “what” decisions are made: at my local drugstore – suburban downton area – CVS eschewed padlocking the Jack, the Jim or the $50/stick mascara; what did they choose? The $5.99 four-packs of wine. Aye-yay-yey!!
Amazon is a solution to reduce shopper frustration when brick-and-mortar retailers lock up products. Unless there’s prompt product retrieval or the item isn’t an urgent need, some shoppers may feel annoyed enough to switch to a rival’s business.
Locking up Merchandise under ~$50 is a no win situation. It reduces top line sales and overall Customer satisfaction. The knee jerk reaction is that this problem is store location specific. However, The organized theft is driving the shrink issue into every corner of in physical retail. Long term solution is going to be an abundance of components contributing to the evolution of a more shrink resistant user experience. Some of the key components will include Shelf tags or Pre-printed cards that Contain all of the product content that the consumer can easily read in the store, QR codes on the Shelves that link to product information and reviews, linking phones to loyalty apps and other tech solutions that allow for the unlocking of the product.
It makes sense. People are stealing and retailers don’t want to take the loss. Nor should they. The problem is, it is sales prevention and makes legitimate, paying customers feel like criminals and oftentimes sends them online, to Amazon or others. Walmart has an interesting solution with utilizing phone numbers, but that puts the effort on the customer and creates objection there as well. Until someone figures out a seamless way to enable customers while disabling thieves, no one is going to be happy and impulse purchasing is going to go by the wayside.
I truly can’t get over this. Somehow we went from “just walk out “ to merchandise in prison. Neither makes much sense. Walmart’s idea is intriguing. But overall, I just don’t think shrink was high enough to justify this, and neither help much with employee theft. Those are the people with the keys….
Im sorry if I’m off base, I just feel like this is an absurd initiative. The levels of shrink don’t warrant it and it’s 12 steps back. Like I said, the Walmart experiment is intriguing, but do we expect roving gangs of people with lock breakers to overtake the store?
Over the years I have been shocked seeing merchandise locked up in US stores – particularly in cities. For whatever reason, I perceive merchandise in locked cabinets (example in pharmacies) – where I need to ask for help – more of a disincentive to buy than items that have security devices that need to be removed at the point of sale.
Either way – retailers tread a tricky line of minimising loss versus putting shoppers off buying.
Asking staff to unlock cabinets is a major source of friction – I have sometimes wondered if customers might be able to unlock themselves with a credit card or similar – but don’t believe the technology exists for this – with or without retailer and consumer acceptance..
Locked up merchandise is a poor excuse for not being able to adequately staff a store. The true question remains if locked up mechandise costs are greater than increased staffing costs and losing the sales of the locked up goods. I doubt that shrink on these items, except electronics, is worth it. Higher staffing, which will minimize OOSs, increase the customer shopping experience, and increase sales, seems to be the obvious solution all around.
Agree with you, Kai. The challenge is finding the staff to hire.
The big question is where is the point where this makes sense versus where it doesn’t. Does it make sense to lock up low cost items? Likely not. But there is a point where the value of items in certain areas does likely make sense. However I agree that at any level this negatively impacts the customer experience.
There are some eye-opening facts behind the concerning developments with retail theft, the impacts on the retail pharmacy industry, and the unfortunate fact that retailers are starting to abandon major US cities:
- The increasing threat of retail theft cost the retail industry $112.1 billion in losses last year, a 19% increase over 2021 levels, according to a new study by the National Retail Federation
- Retail Pharmacy operations responded quickly by putting those items behind glass, only to find that what was intended as a theft-prevention measure, ironically, has turned into a sales-prevention one
- Fundamentally, there is a loss of psychological safety and security, and it also raises concerns with customers that shopping there may be a dangerous experience
However, while the rise of retail theft is very concerning, we must consider that losses attributed to shrink are incorrectly intertwined with criminal acts. There are operational inefficiencies and challenges across the global supply chain that lead to product damages, loss, and systemic issues related to inventory management that have had an impact on the retail industry’s bottom line that frequently need to be taken into account.
There are no immediate solutions for the rise of retail theft despite the best mitigation strategies implemented by Costco Wholesale, Lowe’s Companies, Inc., Best Buy, Tractor Supply Company, and others. Unfortunately, despite the recent news reports and viral social media posts, retail crime is not widely considered a serious enough offense for law enforcement to provide more of a presence in areas that recent thefts have impacted.
The last thing we want to do is to put the accountability on store associates, as it leaves them in situations where they could be injured and their livelihoods impacted.
Hey Brandon…can you provide a link to this data? And when you say the increasing threat of retail theft” do you mean it has actually occurred, or that retailers fear it?
thanks
Hey Paula. I did an extensive article on this subject, and gathered some insights from this NRF led study https://cdn.nrf.com/sites/default/files/2023-09/NRF_National_Retail_Security_Survey_2023.pdf
The crimes actually occurred.
Here is my article: https://brandonrael.substack.com/p/the-concerning-impacts-of-the-rise
Part of the solution is to be pragmatic on how much product is locked up – anything over $25 or $50?
Perhaps it’s just me – I’ve only seen significant product locked up in a Manhattan pharmacy retailer. But there, it seemed about 90% of the store was locked up. I was surprised that a $5-6 item was locked away. To be fair, I didn’t wait more than 30 seconds for a store associate to help me, but I was still astounded by the volume of assortment under lock and key.
There are only a couple of solutions to this issue. The first one is to close the store due to high theft. I mean who wants to shop in a store with everything locked up? You might as well just shop online. The second solution might be on the horizon given the recent election results, and that is start arresting the shoplifters.
Technology will assist here, but it will NOT be the solution.
100%, Mark. Technology only goes part of the distance. Until local governments increase visibility of law enforcement in communities, and courts deliver consequences for shoplifting, at some point the ROI drifts closer to closing up stores for online ordering.
Having worked in retail technology for my entire career, I feel qualified in saying that applying technology to this problem is not probable and a futile endeavor. If retailers feel that items need to be locked up, the options are to reduce the breadth of items under lock and key, add staff to unlock items promptly, or suffer the theft.
Locking up merchandise sends two messages (at least) from the retailer to the customer:
- We don’t trust you.
- You are in a store where theft is a problem. Perhaps the customer might wonder, “Is the store safe?”
Neither of those messages represents the brand well. The numbers paint an ugly picture for retailers.
Consider this question: Is the loss of business worth how much is stolen (if the merch wasn’t locked up)?
We’ve covered the topic before in RetailWire, but it may be worth bringing it up again.Tougher penalties and a lower tolerance for theft could help reduce the theft problem.
Andy Jassy is right about the growingly frustrating in-store customer experience at pharmacies. If locking up merchandise continues to be the defacto fall back, Amazon will gladly serve their unhappy customers.
Assuming local community governments continue look the other way on theft, even the best technology won’t fix everything. But one solution to help, is pharmacies could take on the endeavor to convert in-store inventory to real-time and online, so customers can see availability, and pre-order for pick-up at the counter. Real-time POS systems costs money, requires greater diligence in receiving, with frequent inventory monitoring. But is it more expensive than locking up over 30% of your products, resulting in lost sales from discouraged or frustrated customers? At what point is it that loss measured, and determined its time for change?
The first message a shopper receives when they encounter products locked behind plexiglass is, “This store is not a safe place.”
That may well be true in some instances, but retailers pay a price when shoppers must wait for staff help, or when they simply walk away.
Any form of product lock-up makes examining a product’s ingredients or specs more difficult for the shopper.
I suppose the concept of allowing shoppers to unlock or dispense items from secure displays using their loyalty app holds some promise. It still conveys mistrust, though.
In the end it comes down to the arithmetic versus optics. A few looting events certainly gained media attention, and the idea that shoplifters are selling pilfered jugs of laundry detergent or baby formula on TikTok is very irritating. But plastic vaults are not free; staff time is not free; missed sales are regrettable. Have retailers calculated the net financial benefits?
If some perpetrators have turned shoplifting into a business, that’s no longer petty theft – that’s a racket. I’d have no problem seeing those worst actors in prison.
The combination of lower levels off store staffing and locked up merchandise is a bad mix. Hampers sales and creates a horrible shopper experience. The goal of a store is to grab and go not wait and wait and no one comes.
Some higher value items could benefit from a subscription service instead of being locked up. Diapers, razors, batteries, formula, etc. Not a perfect solution but part of a solution to maintain sales and customer satisfaction.
Locking up merchandise adds friction to the shopping experience and often leads to lost sales. No one wants to be left waiting for help or hunting down an employee to unlock an item, especially for everyday essentials.
There are smarter ways to manage security without compromising the shopping experience. By leveraging technology solutions, like digital help requests and SKU-level shopping, retailers can keep products secure while reducing friction for shoppers. It’s time for retailers to embrace innovative solutions that protect both their inventory and the customer experience.
Locking up products is a lazy solution that frustrates customers and hurts sales. Retailers need to invest in smarter options like staffed assistance zones or visible associates dedicated to unlocking items quickly.
App-based unlocking or QR codes can help, but only if they’re seamless and don’t invade privacy. Another way is through initiatives like BOPIS, since customers pay for the items upfront, there’s less opportunity for theft. Better inventory tracking, store layouts that deter theft, and partnerships with local law enforcement could address shrink without alienating loyal shoppers.
Honest customers shouldn’t feel punished for theft issues. If retailers keep this up, they’ll drive more people to online competitors where frustration-free shopping wins every time.
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Locking up merchandise creates a terrible customer experience, it increases the workload for staff, it deters customers from buying, and so forth. However, there is also a material cost that can be measured in dollars and cents. Our research estimates that across the first half of this year, retailers lost $338 million in sales because of locking things away. Most of these sales do not disappear entirely – especially for essentials items like laundry detergent or toothpaste – shoppers simply go elsewhere. From our estimates the main beneficiary, picking up almost 58% of the lost sales, is Amazon.
The real solution is not to lock things away. Failing that, allowing customers to unlock cabinets themselves – using smartphones linked to membership of loyalty programs, for example – is a way of mitigating (though not entirely solving) the issue.
The number of retail crimes is out of control, and store managers and executives are looking for answers, but lock and key creates more problems than what it resolves.
Progressive politicians need to understand that police need to be fully funded and staffed, and that they must be allowed to enforce laws as fully as possible, but I won’t hold my breath.
Consumers are turned off by lock and key. It destroys impulse shopping. It is rare for stores to have enough personnel to assist customers quickly, if even at all. Making comparisons and reading packages is difficult for consumers.
It is important for retailers to get their merchandise back on the shelves. A certain price point is “ok” to lock up merchandise. Any item under $50 should be readable, touchable, and consumable without the assistance of store employees.
Another conflict of interest exists. Companies are being forced to ditch boxes and design products, especially bottles, to stand on shelves without boxes. Boxes make theft more difficult.
During the NACDS Annual Meeting this past Spring, I spoke with several top executives. In summary, most consider this the most pressing problem they face. Local governments, especially in urban areas, seem to deny or underestimate the rampant theft problem, especially from masked gangs, according to CEOs.
To enforce the need for fully staffed police departments with cops allowed to do their jobs, retail executives must meet with mayors personally.
Hi David. Can you please provide some data that “the number of retail crimes is out of control?” I haven’t seen any.
thanks!
What solutions do you see to reducing shopper frustrations when products need to be locked up due to high shrink?
> None
Do any technology solutions appear viable?
>Such as? This is 435% an issue of cost effectiveness: if the margin on an item is low AND safeguading it requires labor intensive security methods, it’s unlikely that selling it will remain viable.
My final thought: I’d love to be a fly-on-the-wall when these “what” decisions are made: at my local drugstore – suburban downton area – CVS eschewed padlocking the Jack, the Jim or the $50/stick mascara; what did they choose? The $5.99 four-packs of wine. Aye-yay-yey!!
Amazon is a solution to reduce shopper frustration when brick-and-mortar retailers lock up products. Unless there’s prompt product retrieval or the item isn’t an urgent need, some shoppers may feel annoyed enough to switch to a rival’s business.
Locking up Merchandise under ~$50 is a no win situation. It reduces top line sales and overall Customer satisfaction. The knee jerk reaction is that this problem is store location specific. However, The organized theft is driving the shrink issue into every corner of in physical retail. Long term solution is going to be an abundance of components contributing to the evolution of a more shrink resistant user experience. Some of the key components will include Shelf tags or Pre-printed cards that Contain all of the product content that the consumer can easily read in the store, QR codes on the Shelves that link to product information and reviews, linking phones to loyalty apps and other tech solutions that allow for the unlocking of the product.
It makes sense. People are stealing and retailers don’t want to take the loss. Nor should they. The problem is, it is sales prevention and makes legitimate, paying customers feel like criminals and oftentimes sends them online, to Amazon or others. Walmart has an interesting solution with utilizing phone numbers, but that puts the effort on the customer and creates objection there as well. Until someone figures out a seamless way to enable customers while disabling thieves, no one is going to be happy and impulse purchasing is going to go by the wayside.
I truly can’t get over this. Somehow we went from “just walk out “ to merchandise in prison. Neither makes much sense. Walmart’s idea is intriguing. But overall, I just don’t think shrink was high enough to justify this, and neither help much with employee theft. Those are the people with the keys….
Im sorry if I’m off base, I just feel like this is an absurd initiative. The levels of shrink don’t warrant it and it’s 12 steps back. Like I said, the Walmart experiment is intriguing, but do we expect roving gangs of people with lock breakers to overtake the store?
Over the years I have been shocked seeing merchandise locked up in US stores – particularly in cities. For whatever reason, I perceive merchandise in locked cabinets (example in pharmacies) – where I need to ask for help – more of a disincentive to buy than items that have security devices that need to be removed at the point of sale.
Either way – retailers tread a tricky line of minimising loss versus putting shoppers off buying.
Asking staff to unlock cabinets is a major source of friction – I have sometimes wondered if customers might be able to unlock themselves with a credit card or similar – but don’t believe the technology exists for this – with or without retailer and consumer acceptance..
Locked up merchandise is a poor excuse for not being able to adequately staff a store. The true question remains if locked up mechandise costs are greater than increased staffing costs and losing the sales of the locked up goods. I doubt that shrink on these items, except electronics, is worth it. Higher staffing, which will minimize OOSs, increase the customer shopping experience, and increase sales, seems to be the obvious solution all around.
Agree with you, Kai. The challenge is finding the staff to hire.
The big question is where is the point where this makes sense versus where it doesn’t. Does it make sense to lock up low cost items? Likely not. But there is a point where the value of items in certain areas does likely make sense. However I agree that at any level this negatively impacts the customer experience.
There are some eye-opening facts behind the concerning developments with retail theft, the impacts on the retail pharmacy industry, and the unfortunate fact that retailers are starting to abandon major US cities:
However, while the rise of retail theft is very concerning, we must consider that losses attributed to shrink are incorrectly intertwined with criminal acts. There are operational inefficiencies and challenges across the global supply chain that lead to product damages, loss, and systemic issues related to inventory management that have had an impact on the retail industry’s bottom line that frequently need to be taken into account.
There are no immediate solutions for the rise of retail theft despite the best mitigation strategies implemented by Costco Wholesale, Lowe’s Companies, Inc., Best Buy, Tractor Supply Company, and others. Unfortunately, despite the recent news reports and viral social media posts, retail crime is not widely considered a serious enough offense for law enforcement to provide more of a presence in areas that recent thefts have impacted.
The last thing we want to do is to put the accountability on store associates, as it leaves them in situations where they could be injured and their livelihoods impacted.
Hey Brandon…can you provide a link to this data? And when you say the increasing threat of retail theft” do you mean it has actually occurred, or that retailers fear it?
thanks
Hey Paula. I did an extensive article on this subject, and gathered some insights from this NRF led study https://cdn.nrf.com/sites/default/files/2023-09/NRF_National_Retail_Security_Survey_2023.pdf
The crimes actually occurred.
Here is my article: https://brandonrael.substack.com/p/the-concerning-impacts-of-the-rise
Part of the solution is to be pragmatic on how much product is locked up – anything over $25 or $50?
Perhaps it’s just me – I’ve only seen significant product locked up in a Manhattan pharmacy retailer. But there, it seemed about 90% of the store was locked up. I was surprised that a $5-6 item was locked away. To be fair, I didn’t wait more than 30 seconds for a store associate to help me, but I was still astounded by the volume of assortment under lock and key.
There are only a couple of solutions to this issue. The first one is to close the store due to high theft. I mean who wants to shop in a store with everything locked up? You might as well just shop online. The second solution might be on the horizon given the recent election results, and that is start arresting the shoplifters.
Technology will assist here, but it will NOT be the solution.
100%, Mark. Technology only goes part of the distance. Until local governments increase visibility of law enforcement in communities, and courts deliver consequences for shoplifting, at some point the ROI drifts closer to closing up stores for online ordering.
Having worked in retail technology for my entire career, I feel qualified in saying that applying technology to this problem is not probable and a futile endeavor. If retailers feel that items need to be locked up, the options are to reduce the breadth of items under lock and key, add staff to unlock items promptly, or suffer the theft.
Locking up merchandise sends two messages (at least) from the retailer to the customer:
Neither of those messages represents the brand well. The numbers paint an ugly picture for retailers.
Consider this question: Is the loss of business worth how much is stolen (if the merch wasn’t locked up)?
We’ve covered the topic before in RetailWire, but it may be worth bringing it up again.Tougher penalties and a lower tolerance for theft could help reduce the theft problem.
Andy Jassy is right about the growingly frustrating in-store customer experience at pharmacies. If locking up merchandise continues to be the defacto fall back, Amazon will gladly serve their unhappy customers.
Assuming local community governments continue look the other way on theft, even the best technology won’t fix everything. But one solution to help, is pharmacies could take on the endeavor to convert in-store inventory to real-time and online, so customers can see availability, and pre-order for pick-up at the counter. Real-time POS systems costs money, requires greater diligence in receiving, with frequent inventory monitoring. But is it more expensive than locking up over 30% of your products, resulting in lost sales from discouraged or frustrated customers? At what point is it that loss measured, and determined its time for change?
The first message a shopper receives when they encounter products locked behind plexiglass is, “This store is not a safe place.”
That may well be true in some instances, but retailers pay a price when shoppers must wait for staff help, or when they simply walk away.
Any form of product lock-up makes examining a product’s ingredients or specs more difficult for the shopper.
I suppose the concept of allowing shoppers to unlock or dispense items from secure displays using their loyalty app holds some promise. It still conveys mistrust, though.
In the end it comes down to the arithmetic versus optics. A few looting events certainly gained media attention, and the idea that shoplifters are selling pilfered jugs of laundry detergent or baby formula on TikTok is very irritating. But plastic vaults are not free; staff time is not free; missed sales are regrettable. Have retailers calculated the net financial benefits?
If some perpetrators have turned shoplifting into a business, that’s no longer petty theft – that’s a racket. I’d have no problem seeing those worst actors in prison.
The combination of lower levels off store staffing and locked up merchandise is a bad mix. Hampers sales and creates a horrible shopper experience. The goal of a store is to grab and go not wait and wait and no one comes.
Some higher value items could benefit from a subscription service instead of being locked up. Diapers, razors, batteries, formula, etc. Not a perfect solution but part of a solution to maintain sales and customer satisfaction.
Locking up merchandise adds friction to the shopping experience and often leads to lost sales. No one wants to be left waiting for help or hunting down an employee to unlock an item, especially for everyday essentials.
There are smarter ways to manage security without compromising the shopping experience. By leveraging technology solutions, like digital help requests and SKU-level shopping, retailers can keep products secure while reducing friction for shoppers. It’s time for retailers to embrace innovative solutions that protect both their inventory and the customer experience.
Locking up products is a lazy solution that frustrates customers and hurts sales. Retailers need to invest in smarter options like staffed assistance zones or visible associates dedicated to unlocking items quickly.
App-based unlocking or QR codes can help, but only if they’re seamless and don’t invade privacy. Another way is through initiatives like BOPIS, since customers pay for the items upfront, there’s less opportunity for theft. Better inventory tracking, store layouts that deter theft, and partnerships with local law enforcement could address shrink without alienating loyal shoppers.
Honest customers shouldn’t feel punished for theft issues. If retailers keep this up, they’ll drive more people to online competitors where frustration-free shopping wins every time.