Jumbo loses more money on stolen products than the company makes profits, it was announced this week. More than 100 million euros were stolen last year, while the net profit is expected to be just under 80 million euros. Other stores are also seeing an increase in theft figures. Why does that happen and what can be done about it?
1. How much more is being stolen?
The entire retail sector, from clothing stores and jewelers to supermarkets and electronics stores, suffers 2 billion euros in damage annually due to theft on a turnover of 134 billion euros, industry association INretail estimates. “But with the new figures from this one supermarket, that may still be too conservative.” The 2 billion euro figure probably does not give the complete picture. More concrete data can be found at the police, who noted a slight increase last year.
Jumbo says that 60 percent more shoplifting cases were registered at the chain last year than in 2022. In many branches, the loss due to stolen products would amount to approximately 1 percent of turnover. A significant increase: a year ago this was still half a percent. This loss percentage also applied to other supermarkets in 2022, according to a report by market researcher Marshoek.
Meat is particularly popular with the thieves' guild because it is one of the more expensive supermarket products, according to retail consultant Richard Kievit from Marshoek. A lot is also disappearing in the fruit and vegetable department: customers can cheat there by weighing fewer apples or bananas than they put in their basket.
Last year the police registered more than 41,000 shoplifting cases, with figures for December missing. This makes the year higher than 2022, when a total of 40,000 thefts were known to the police. Since 2012, the number of shoplifting cases, which the police are aware of, has fluctuated between 43,000 and 37,000. Only in 2020 and 2021 was there a significant drop to fewer than 31,000 thefts. Due to the store closures as a result of the corona measures, there was less to steal.
The police see that three quarters of the thefts known to them are committed by opportunistic thieves, individual people who steal something once or occasionally for their own use. The rest are committed by professional gangs. They do it for the money and steal expensive products that they can resell.
Shopkeepers do not necessarily have to go to the police if they catch a thief. If the shoplifter admits to having stolen and wants to cooperate, the entrepreneur and the person caught can enter into an agreement through the Service Organization Direct Liability (SODA). This is an organization that collects compensation on behalf of companies, without the intervention of a judge. The thief then agrees to pay compensation of 181 euros and the retailer does not report the crime. 4,000 cases are handled in this way every year.
If a thief does not want to cooperate, the police are called. SODA then receives the thief's details from the police afterwards and sends a claim for 181 euros. The organization can do this because it is authorized by many retail companies and acts as an advocate, such as for Albert Heijn and Jumbo. In total, SODA processes 32,000 thefts per year (this concerns all cases, including those in which the police are involved).
Can SODA just do that? “Everyone is free to ask for compensation if someone has done something unlawful to you,” says Joep Lindeman, associate professor of criminal law at Utrecht University. “But you can't force someone to do that. For example, stores are not allowed to detain thieves until they sign.”
SODA director Arie Jan van Os says that stores call the police if someone does not want to sign. “But if the police cannot come and we do not know who the thief is, then we are indeed at a loss.”
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Not every grocery robber is caught. Retailers can see in their inventory systems exactly how many products come in and how many leave the store through the cash register or because they are spoiled. The difference that remains is called 'grey loss': products that have disappeared without explanation. The damage suffered as a result is much greater than can be explained by the number of thieves caught.
2. Is there more theft at self-checkouts?
Shoplifting is often linked to the rise of self-checkouts. The idea is that it is tempting for customers standing at such an unmanned cash register to let those expensive salmon steaks disappear into their bags unscanned. Or to stick a banana sticker over the barcode, which means you can get a much lower price.
Supermarkets are not unanimous about the influence of self-checkouts. In a response, Dirk refers mainly to rising prices due to inflation: theft “unfortunately occurs more often than usual in financially difficult times.” Jumbo tells the ANP news agency that a third of all thefts occur at self-scanners. “But it is not necessarily the case that stores where we do not have self-scanning have less trouble with shoplifting.” At the same time, Vomar decided a year ago to focus less on self-scanning because it would be abused too much.
Market researcher Marshoek thinks that both factors, inflation and cash registers, play a role. “These self-scan checkouts have been around for a number of years, but previously they did not lead to such a large increase,” says retail consultant Kievit. “At the same time, it is easier to steal there, so there are people who will give it a try in times of tight wallets.”
3. How can supermarkets prevent theft?
Jumbo wants to test various methods in the near future, such as the smarter use of checks at the self-checkout. For example, there are products that can be linked together because they are often purchased together: a crate of beer and a bag of chips, for example. If you only scan the beer, there is a chance that someone will come and check whether you have forgotten to pay for the chips. Other supermarkets are also taking steps, but do not want to say which ones.
Supermarkets are reluctant to take measures that could frustrate customers. Customers are already irritated or even angry if they have to undergo a sample check even though everything has been properly scanned. That is why companies are considering detecting suspicious behavior with cameras. The French software company Veesion is one of the parties that offers such technology. In the Netherlands, Veesion is used by approximately 150 stores, largely supermarkets owned by independent entrepreneurs. The Netherlands had 6,400 supermarkets at the beginning of 2023.
Stores can connect their cameras to the company's software and then receive a notification on their phone as soon as a suspicious action is detected. “For example, when someone takes a product from the shelf and puts it in a jacket pocket or bag,” says Ulbe Keegstra, who represents the company in the Benelux. “The entrepreneur can then assess for himself whether there is a case of theft and take action.”
However, Veesion's software does not work at the self-checkout points. “That is a completely different type of theft, we can now only identify theft in the store itself,” says Keegstra. “It is very complex to recognize on camera images that someone is tapping a product incorrectly at the cash register. Veesion's software does not currently see this as suspicious behavior, but we are working on it.”
According to the Dutch Data Protection Authority (AP), companies are allowed to use cameras to protect their property. There are requirements: customers and employees must be informed, for example with a sign at the entrance. The images may not be kept longer than necessary and people who are filmed have the right to view the images and have them deleted. Hidden cameras may only be used temporarily and only as a last resort. Facial recognition is not allowed: Jumbo was reprimanded for this by the AP in 2020.
Experts point to another way to reduce the risk of theft: more and better trained staff. “If you greet customers, chat and create a positive atmosphere, less is stolen,” says Van Os of SODA. “It is more difficult to steal from a friend than from an enemy.”
Correction January 6, 2024: An earlier version of this article stated that the Netherlands had 64,000 supermarkets in 2023. This should be 6,400 and has been adjusted above.
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