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POLICIES & ISSUES: RETAIL CRIME
OVERVIEW OF RETAIL CRIME
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Retail crime is a major issue for retailers and society. It cost the industry £1 billion in 2003 with crime prevention costing an additional £960 million - a total of £1.96 billion. In addition, retail crime cost each family in the UK an additional £100 on their annual shopping bills.
BRC annual Retail Crime Survey
The BRC produces an annual retail crime survey, which is the most authoritative national and international commentary on retail crime. It sets out the costs of crime, the volume of offences, crime prevention and comments on many of the current issues facing the industry. It is essential reading for all those involved in retailing, where crime costs are a significant area of loss of profitability, as well as others involved in retailing - security organisations, academics, consultants, analysts etc.
On October 31 2007, the BRC held the Retail Loss Prevention Conference 2007: Protecting Profits with Effective Policies, Process and Products. The conference launched the latest Retail Crime Survey.  Click here for more information.
Drugs and retail crime
Retailers arrested a large number of customer thieves as a result of shop crime and many (perhaps the majority) are drug users who are stealing to support their habit. Certainly research carried out amongst drug users and arrestees indicates that over 65% of those arrested tested positive for drugs or indicated that they had used drugs and were stealing to support their habit. The connection between drugs and retail theft is strong and is one of the areas of concern for retailers.
Young people and retail crime
Another is the involvement of young people in shop theft - whether through greed, peer group pressure, bullying or other reasons. The BRC Retail Crime Survey for 2000 has identified that where the age of offenders is known, 16% are under the age of 18. Stealing from shops is a gateway crime for many young offenders who go on to further and more serious offending.
Professional, persistent and travelling thieves
Many of the high loss crimes, which can amount to thousands of pounds in a day, are committed by thieves who are stealing to order, either locally or nationally. They travel the country, visiting town, city and shopping centres and stealing quantities of merchandise to order or for disposal to identified third parties. They are a serious threat and need to be managed by pooling information, circulating it to other retailers and ensuring that they are given the opportunity to use this information to meet the challenge through intelligence-led policing of the problem.
Retail and business crime partnerships
The BRC has been in the forefront of retail crime prevention, developing over 200 retail crime partnerships in retail and shopping centres. These work by combining the benefits of public CCTV, radio links, photograph and information sharing and exclusion notices to identify retail thieves, share information about them, track their movements and confront them before they commit offences. Many of these partnerships are now appointing crime co-ordinators to ensure a pro-active approach to the problem. This is the most effective means of managing the behaviour of known offenders.
Independent retailers and crime
Many independent, and by definition, smaller retailers also suffer from crime - in a number of cases their experience of crime is more personal. Their ability to combat crime may also be more difficult because of financial circumstances, or the nature of the goods they sell, their location or the hours they trade. BRC has lobbied the Home Office on this issue and in response the government has set aside £15 million in grants for small retailers in deprived areas for physical crime prevention improvements. This is a first step and we look forward to working with the government in assessing and developing this programme further in the future.
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