According to a recent study by PWC (PriceWaterhouseCoopers) and the RCC (Retail Council of Canada), more than 10 million dollars a day is lost to shrinkage by Canadian Retailers.
The joint study conducted in 2011 revealed shrink rates between 0.4 percent and 2.19 percent of net sales with an average loss of 1.04 percent due to shrink. Thirty four retailers took part in the PWC/RCC survey representing 24 percent of the total estimated retail sales in Canada for 2011.
Paul Beaumont of PWC states “To put retail shrink in perspective, total dollars lost to shrink is almost the same amount as the total investment made each year by the entire Canadian retail industry in their IT departments and more than what retailers invested in their finance departments”
According to Doyle Serink with Ion Security, various strategies can be implemented to reduce shrink including security cameras (CCTV), RFID tags, overt and covert security guards, alarm systems, access control and tip hotlines just to name a few. Doyle tells of a client who put security cameras inside the cooler of his restaurant to prevent staff from eating away the profits.
“The location already had a robust CCTV system, says Doyle but even with a camera pointed on the outside door of the cooler, shrink still was occurring. While the outside camera was doing it’s job the shrink continued at a lower rate as staff began consuming goods inside the cooler or breaking them down into smaller, easier to conceal portions”. We are not losing case lots anymore remarked owner Paul Gee but shrink was still occurring albeit a a smaller rate.
Ion Security’s • Cooler Cam
Enter the ‘Cooler Cam’. Ion Security installed a day/night, weatherproof camera right inside the cooler to monitor activity and once the camera went up, shrink went down to almost zero! Paul commented, before the cameras shrink was as high as $7,000 one month on cooler related products, since the Ion Cameras were installed, shrink dropped to less than $100 a month on average and we even had one month with almost zero shrink on our cooler products says Paul.
According to the PWC/RCC survey 65 percent of respondents said they have one or more countermeasures installed to monitor retail merchandise theft and those measures seem to be working. In 2011 retail merchandise theft was down 52 percent from 2008 however the same survey revealed theft by internal sources increased 175 percent during the same time period (2008-2011).
Most retailers are doing a good job taking preventive measures to reduce theft on the retail sales floor, internally it’s another story says Serink. “Employers generally are more hesitant to place cameras in employee only areas, saying things like we trust our staff or we don’t want our employees to feel like Big Brother’s watching them.” While these statements have some validity, theft from internal sources is a real problem and on the rise.
In todays ‘YouTube’ era where everyone has a cell phone camera, people’s expectation of privacy is far lower than it was a decade ago. Between traffic cameras, surveillance cams and personal cell phone cameras the average person is photographed at least 25 times during a routine day going to work, out for lunch or groceries, picking up the kids from school and then driving home for example.
Employers shouldn’t be hesitant installing cameras in employee areas where shrink may be an issue with the exception of washrooms or change rooms. When it comes to washrooms and change rooms, these areas are strictly off limits. Cameras should never be installed in any area where a person should have a reasonable expectation of privacy.
Doyle Serink is a Security and Loss Prevention Specialist. He can be contacted at Ion Security 780-489-5522 or click the email link Ion Security
Fines for false alarms in the City of Edmonton have tripled for 2013.
With abysmally low conviction rates, thieves are becoming more brazen than ever at committing daytime crimes and offenses.
Nowadays young kids are in pre-school or daycare and our neighbors like us are at work leaving some neighborhoods virtual ghost towns during the day … this is a prime hot spot for thieves”. “We had a client who called us to install an alarm and security camera after her home was broken into in the middle of the afternoon. The neighborhood was so empty, the thieves actually backed up avan into their driveway and walked out with their flat screen TV’s, computers, electronics and even their Lazyboy chair All this happened in the middle of the afternoon”.
If you watched TV over the weekend you may have noticed you weren’t running for the remote control to turn down those loud, annoying TV commercials anymore. Effective Saturday September 1st, 2012 the CRTC requires all Canadian broadcasters to ensure that the audio volume of all Television commercials is within the same range as the television program audio volume.
With Distracted Driving legislation everywhere talking on your cellphone in the car is not only dangerous but can be very costly. Most states and provinces with distracted driving laws allow for some sort of “Hands Free” use of your cell phone while driving but the majority of cars on the road today do not have factory built-in Bluetooth speakers leaving millions of drivers with the choice of either expensive hardwired bluetooth systems or cheap battery powered, portable bluetooth handsfree devices.
Griffin’s motion-sensing Auto Connect technology, automatically connects with paired smartphones as soon as you enter the car. A feature called Multipoint enables you to connect up to two phones at the same time to the SmartTalk and answering the phone is as simple as pressing the talk button or by using your phone’s built in voice commands (if equipped).
