‘Time to address crime or face a US-style retail flight from troubled towns’

In some places, staff are as likely to be wearing bodycams as name badges, such is the scale of the problem and the threat to property and safety.

This week, Primark parent ABF’s chief executive George Weston urged: “Those who are responsible for law and order need to help us get on top of this.”

His comments came as John Lewis Partnership chair Dame Sharon White labelled some town centres “looting grounds” afflicted by an “epidemic” of shoplifting.

Tesco is following in the footsteps of retailers such as the Co-op and Sainsbury’s to offer employees body cameras, following a steep rise in violence against them.

“Retailers deserve better than they’ve been getting from the police and authorities, who have often been reluctant to recognise the effect that retail crime has”

Much of the crime hitting retail it seems is perpetrated by organised gangs – a point backed up by JLP’s White during questions on the retailer’s results call.

Sussex police and crime commissioner Katy Bourne, the national lead for business and retail crime, has told The Times that 20% of offenders are responsible for 80% of shoplifting in her area.

Retailers deserve better than they’ve been getting from the police and authorities, who have often been reluctant to recognise the effect that retail crime has.

The most recent British Retail Consortium annual survey, released in March this year, revealed that the level of violence and abuse against staff is almost double pre-pandemic levels and the total cost of retail crime was £1.76bn in 2021/22.

Retailers spent £715m on crime prevention that year, and the cost is only likely to get higher unless the crisis is dealt with.

So pressing is the problem that retailers have launched a new scheme, Project Pegasus. Funded by 10 big names such as Next as well as grocers, it is costing them £600,000.

The programme will deploy facial-recognition technology to pass images to the police. Bourne maintained it will be a “game changer”, providing for the first time “a complete picture across the country of where these gangs are hitting different areas, and they’ll have that data and intelligence to be able to put that out to local police forces to go after those gangs”. 

Let’s hope so.

Earlier this week, Iceland boss Richard Walker tweeted: “We’re spending more than ever on security, yet serious incidents have never been higher. This is a matter of staff safety: the govt urgently need to review police funding and resources, but also the powers that our security officers have.”

Walker makes an important point about enforcing existing powers. Violence against shopworkers was made an aggravated offence in England last year, following a campaign by retailers, notably Jo Whitfield when she was at the Co-op.

In Scotland, a Protection of Workers Act has won retail support. White cited the Scottish example as an approach she’d like to see replicated.

The Act has resulted in more than 7,000 cases of abuse and violence being reported, but trade body the Scottish Grocers’ Federation has called for data to be made public on how many arrests and convictions have followed.

“In cities such as San Francisco, crime and associated problems have contributed to a retail exodus as big names, including Whole Foods Market and Old Navy, quit”

The US stands as a grim warning of one sort of retail future if crime is not brought under control.

In cities such as San Francisco, crime and associated problems have contributed to a retail exodus as big names, including Whole Foods Market and Old Navy, quit.

In Portland, Walmart said in May that it would shut both its branches and Nike is closing its factory outlet there.

The Co-op has reported that one of its inner London shops was “looted” three times in a single day and warned: “This level of out-of-control crime is unsustainable and could even see some communities become a no-go area for local stores.”

There is still time to avoid replicating the US experience, but it’s time to address retail crime or face a US-style flight from troubled towns.

The issue seems to be moving up the political and police agenda, and decisive action cannot come too quickly.

The real costs of retail crime must be recognised – a cost that is not only burdening retail employees, but ultimately will be paid by society in higher prices and a more fragile sense of civic pride and wellbeing in the places they live and shop.