I was in Penny’s yesterday (flannel shirts for $10). A shoplifter could have walked away with half the store, before any employee might wander by. I had to go looking for an employee, which took quite a while, to ask where to go to pick up the shirts I had ordered off their web site.
In Office Depot, the desktop computers on display are fakes, empty cases with no computer innards in them.
An analyst interview indicated that shoplifting has increased 20% from last year.
And all retailers are having this problem.
And of course price increases will follow in addition to inflation.
By the by, I grocery shopped yesterday. I notice most of the items I put in the basket were 50% higher than a year ago. But I’m used to eating the items & I can afford it thus far and so I continue to buy them. Inflation has slowed to 4.9% so I suppose I won’t be reduced to a frijoles & rice diet.
That sounds pretty good, actually. Years ago, people were worrying about something more feline in nature: https://www.purina.com/fancy-feast
Pete
Retailors do not stop stealing at all these days. Any reason the retailor has to hire one of its own lawyers costs far more than the goods being taken. Retailors just let it go.
Just went to look, my use of the word retailor is obsolete. So am I.
The issue isn’t that shoplifting occurs. Shoplifting has always occurred. The issue is that in some circles, shoplifting is becoming accepted, and some even openly state that it should be okay, and, as usual, media amplifies those “extreme” voices and hardly mention anything else on the topic.
If a guy steals something from Walmart and the clerks stop him it goes to court. Walmart has paperwork. At the very least Walmart hires a lawyer. We know this is more than one hour over the duration of this…possibly…possibly much more…The lawyer is going to cost too much. The court system is more expensive than the pair of jeans being taken in the first place. A lot more expensive.
Would they really? Theft is a crime in most jurisdictions and criminal acts are covered by DAs and ADAs. The suspects/offenders would have to hire a lawyer unless they had no money and needed a court-ordered attorney.
Pete
Two things
Any complications with who was detained will be costly. If the person pleads not guilty and gets off they can sue Walmart for damages. Yes the same guilty or innocent people will sue Walmart. Walmart has deep pockets. Opposing lawyers will want the cases.
Any paperwork put in by the local manager of the Walmart has to pass over the desk of a lawyer for the corporation at some point. With thousands of stores that is a lot of work.
Conversation I had with my RS District Manager over a guy who had stuck me with a bad check.
me: I’m heading over to the Sheriff Dept to file a complaint.
DM: I want you in the store selling stuff
me; the guy wrote a bad check.
DM: ( had called the guy and discussed the bad check) he says he will be in to pay part of it, as that is all the money he has
me: if I accept partial payment, I loose the right to go after the rest
DM: I want you in the store selling stuff.
The guy did show up the next day and paid some small fraction of the bad check he wrote. Of course, I never saw another nickle from him.
And people wonder why shop lifting and bad check writing are rampant?
Steve