Shop ‘til you drop. For retailers, that phrase has become an ominous one. As the recession tightened consumer spending, retail business witnessed a similar drop. While a global crime wave of rampant shoplifting did not emerge, retail sales suffered. The reduction in consumer spending meant loss prevention departments had smaller budgets to work with. However, some retailers managed to beat the market. Discount items became a hot commodity, with US chains such as Family Dollar and Dollar General investing in hosted monitoring for hundreds of locations. Hosted solutions helped reduce upfront costs, generating better ROI for retailers and security providers. On the other end of the spectrum, luxury retail is booming. While retailers targeting average-income buyers survive on razor-thin margins, high-end retailers are selling out of their most expensive items. Overall security spending increased 10 percent in 2010, reducing shrink by 5.6 percent, according to the Global Retail Theft Barometer. With shoplifting being a US$45-billion problem, anything that cuts shrink is a welcome investment.
The general mindset toward security remains grudging. Security is seen as an upfront cost, not an investment. Loss prevention officers must explain why they want a solution with a price tag over budget, or that takes up network bandwidth, when it does nothing to reduce shrink. Operational efficiencies that boost sales are worthwhile, which is changing the security dialogue. Instead of identifying shoplifters, security technologies in video or asset tracking are being deployed to increase productivity. As retail operates on slim margins, demonstrating benefits is the way to go. a&s examines the market for retail security, as well as how security is evolving. We look at how solutions are deployed, what the hallmarks of strong performance are and where the future is headed.
Shop ‘til you drop. For retailers, that phrase has become an ominous one. As the recession tightened consumer spending, retail business witnessed a similar drop. While a global crime wave of rampant shoplifting did not emerge, retail sales suffered. The reduction in consumer spending meant loss prevention departments had smaller budgets to work with. However, some retailers managed to beat the market. Discount items became a hot commodity, with US chains such as Family Dollar and Dollar General investing in hosted monitoring for hundreds of locations. Hosted solutions helped reduce upfront costs, generating better ROI for retailers and security providers. On the other end of the spectrum, luxury retail is booming. While retaile...