Girls just wanna have fun...


Barry Vincent is a Non Executive Director of security integrator, Intrepid Security; as well as an associate trainer on retail and supply chain security for ARC International Training. He also runs his own security consultancy. In this article Barry highlights the issues facing retailers who are suffering ever increasing losses on health and beauty merchandise.

I suspect that retailers will not be surprised at the Youth Justice Board’s revelation that little girls are not made of sugar and spice, but that over the past three years have been responsible for an increase of 25% in the number of crimes committed in England and Wales. Whilst the Board’s main concern appears to be on the significant increases in minor assaults, robberies, public order offences and criminal damage, Essex Police Inspector Kevin Whipps, who heads the Children and Young People's unit for Essex Police, identifies a recent increase in young girls stealing things like cosmetics which he reports are very easy to steal, and places the onus on retailers to stop ‘‘that sort of thing going on."

Health and Beauty products in particular, including high ticket priced cosmetics, contribute significantly to shrinkage both from theft and also spoilage, where the product is opened and unofficially ‘tested’, thereby rendering it unsaleable to other customers. These product ranges have for some time been amongst the top products stolen, and the challenge of reducing shrinkage among such ‘hot’ products is a difficult one for merchandisers and loss prevention professionals alike. The two communities are often perceived as having conflicting objectives, where merchandisers are seen to focus on maximising sales at any cost by optimising shelf space and making the products readily accessible to customers, whilst security managers are looking to protect the products, making them more difficult to steal but also potentially more difficult to sell.

Retail product protection strategies invariably fall between two extremes, and will to a large extent depend on the selling preferences or philosophy of the particular retailer. At one end of the scale is the traditional counter-managed ‘defensive’ merchandising approach, where protection for the products is controlled through the presence of dedicated sales staff, but this approach adds the overhead of staff costs and can inhibit sales since staff may not be able to respond adequately to customers in periods of peak demand, or where customers are unwilling to commit time, or submit to the persuasive techniques of the sales person. At the other end of the scale is the self service approach where products are on open display maximizing shelf usage, and where customers can touch, feel and sample the product. With no requirement for a staff presence, staff costs are lower and product sales may be greater through on-shelf availability and thereby improving the potential for ‘impulse’ purchases. Health and Beauty products sold in this way are often afforded limited protection since ‘hard’ tag solutions e.g. safer cases are problematic to deploy because of the variety of product shapes and sizes, including the square box, circular tub, stick and pencil to name but a few. Hard tags are also likely to reduce shelf space and can restrict sales opportunity. ‘Soft’ EAS tags are more frequently used, and despite being enclosed within the outer packaging of the products  can be easily defeated by the initiated and/or the determined thief, and certainly do not deter the serial ‘tester’.

So what is the answer? My education in shrinkage through such knowledgeable individuals as Adrian Beck and Colin Peacock on the ECR shrinkage board, has taught me that there is no ‘silver bullet’ solution, neither is there common agreement as to the effectiveness of specific solutions. Martin Gill’s treatise based on interviews with shoplifters came to no firm conclusions as to the deterrent value or effectiveness of any particular security control to deter shoplifting, and Beck et al in a recent ECR publication concluded that ‘there is a dearth of published information available charting the value of investing in CCTV and EAS…..’, but try getting those retailers who have invested in these technologies to give them up, and doing nothing is not an option.

 

I believe that finding potential store based solutions to reduce shrinkage on Health and Beauty lines is the ‘art of the possible’, and can be achieved by adopting a holistic approach to product protection. Technology has a role to play, but will not in itself solve the problem. It was Lance Armstrong, several times winner of the Tour de France, who said “remember, it’s not just about the bike!”, and security managers would do well to avoid relying on one technology alone to solve their problems. I am firmly of the view that developing an effective solution to product protection can only be successful through cooperation between the relevant interested parties, and this may involve some compromise along the way. This may seem to some like a ‘no brainer’ to some, but I wonder how many security managers talk to their buyers, merchandisers and store managers about the relative risks involved with certain products, so that they can consider and agree the options for displaying and selling these lines e.g. how they are presented to the customer; where they are situated in the store to provide the best opportunity for natural and/or electronic surveillance, and reaching agreement on an approach to product protection that can provide the necessary balance between protection on the one hand and availability on the other. This might require the merchandisers to sacrifice shelf space to achieve it, but on the other hand security managers must be alert to the needs of the merchandisers, and if specific product protection is not appropriate, or cannot be achieved within the store layout they should consider other alternatives involving better deployment of the other resources available to them e.g. better staff awareness or greater involvement of their contracted manned guarding. In my experience security managers often end up owning the problems of loss and shrinkage at the front end, rather than being seen as a resource to help the retailers manage it.  

 

Security providers also have a key role to play in this process, whether selling hardware or people based security solutions. Security providers must be more alert to the needs of their customers and prepared to develop bespoke solutions by investing time in understanding their customers’ specific needs and developing appropriate products e.g. by providing a wider range of product protection solutions, and not just supplying one technology which offers only a generic solution that might coincidentally solve the customer’s problem. I am aware that many suppliers are reaching out to their customers and being more creative in their approach e.g. acknowledging the challenges of the complex size issue that Health and Beauty products present, but they should also be more proactive in seeking greater insight into their customer’s strategies for reducing loss, and improving their own knowledge and awareness of loss prevention and shrinkage which can only help them gain competitive advantage in a highly competitive market. If necessary they may wish to consider employing a consultant with expertise in these areas, and there are a number of independent consultants who offer specific training and workshops focused on these areas of retail security. Retailers themselves also have an obligation to better engage their suppliers by sharing their strategies and key security objectives and develop a genuine ‘partnership approach’, a phrase that we often hear quoted but rarely exists in practice.

 

I am convinced that a genuine commitment to embrace all the stakeholders in developing  the solutions and commitment to solving the problems of loss and shrinkage can achieve a ‘win win’ outcome for all, and ensure that if as Cindy Lauper sings, ‘girls just wanna have fun’, this is not at the expense of retailers’ profits.