As the holiday shopping season approaches, retailers will be adding staff to help capture every sale that they can. One of the training challenges when onboarding that much temporary staff is making sure everyone is on the lookout to prevent merchandise loss. One NBC report shows the rate of shoplifting going up from 5-9% during the holiday season. Here are a few training points for you and your employees to help stop theft in your store.
As the holiday shopping season approaches, retailers will be adding staff to help capture every sale that they can. One of the training challenges when onboarding that much temporary staff is making sure everyone is on the lookout to prevent merchandise loss. One NBC report shows the rate of shoplifting going up from 5-9% during the holiday season. Here are a few training points for you and your employees to help stop theft in your store.
- Conduct Internal Checks - Spot checks of the cash drawer and checking trash bags before taking to the dumpster are helpful to curb employee theft. While we'd like to be able to trust everyone, internal loss can be as costly as someone boosting merchandise from the sales floor, especially in the electronics industry where items are small and expensive.
- Greet All Customers - Many employees balk at this practice, but if a shoplifter knows they are being watched, they may be less likely to steal. This doesn't mean continued observation, but looking the new customer in the eye and saying "Hello!" lets them know they've been seen.
- Good Lighting - The darker your store, the easier it is for someone to hide their actions. Make sure that you have bright lighting even in the corners of your store.
- Open Floor Plan - If there are a lot of displays and high-reaching shelving, it can be difficult to see what people in your store are doing. Make sure you have clean sight lines from the register area.
- Product Facing & Organization - When your products are neatly arranged, it is easy to see at a glance if something is missing. By organizing your store with products properly "faced" (meaning pointed outward & shifted forward), thieves are less likely to "sweep" a product into a bag or other means of carrying the product out of the store.
- Security Cameras - Whether active or just a "camera dome," prominently-placed surveillance equipment can be a real deterrent to theft. Placement of "Monitored by Security Camera" signs also alert potential shoplifters that they could be watched or filmed while inside the store.
Hold training events with your employees so they are familiar with what to look out for - people who seem to be tense or anxious, who are loitering near a certain product, who appear to be watching store employees closely. With PlayerLync you can create your own training videos that are unique to your store, showing employees blind spots that are specific to your store, or the preferred way to stock and face products. You and your employees won't be able to catch every shoplifter who enters your store, but by being alert and following the steps above, hopefully you will keep your employees and customers honest.
