'TIS THE SEASON
Each year at this holiday time, I devote a column to the problem of shoplifting. Over the next few weeks, retail activity will be at its highest of the year. Though it may be hard to believe, for many merchants as much as 50 percent of their retail sales and more than 25 percent of their profit are achieved during this period. It is a rather large irony that in the midst of the holiday good cheer, some among us turn to trouble.
At this time of year in an effort to be helpful to all, we should look at the problem of shoplifting. I hope to help merchants by raising everyone's awareness to this problem, and I hope to help readers — in general — in an effort to spare them the pain of possibly ruining their lives through one senseless act in one senseless moment.
According to the FBI, shoplifting is one of the nation's fastest growing crimes. It's increasing at the alarming rate of 20 percent a year and as you might suspect, most of the shoplifting occurs right now, during the holiday season.
The National Retail Merchants Association estimates that annual shoplifting losses exceed $20 billion a year! Since almost half of those shoplifting losses occur between Thanksgiving and Christmas, it means that shoplifting losses around the country amount to more than $333 million a day, or $27 ¾ million an hour, or almost $500,000 a minute! Is it any wonder that store officials and shop owners are concerned about this stealing epidemic? In short, shoplifting is tearing the heart out of merchant's profit margins.
Store officials say they have caught people from all walks of life shoplifting. You name it, someone from almost every profession has been caught with sticky fingers. For example, store officials say that they have caught doctors, lawyers, teachers, airline pilots, members of the clergy, and yes, even stockbrokers! Interestingly enough, kleptomaniacs — that is people who really have a stealing sickness — account for less than one percent of the total shoplifting.
In short, here are some other statistics that may surprise you:
- 99 percent of all shoplifters apprehended have enough money on them at the time to pay for the merchandise stolen
- 55 percent of all the thefts are committed by middle-income people and another 20 percent by so-called high-income people
- The primary shoplifters (accounting for 45 percent of all thefts) are teenagers
- Teenage girls out-shoplift teenage boys by a margin of 4 to 1
- 58 percent of all shoplifters are female, with 25 percent of all shoplifting crimes committed by housewives
- 80 percent of all shoplifters are caught in suburban stores rather than urban stores
- It is estimated that 1 in every 10 customers shoplifts!
- Each family in the United States spends $300 per year to subsidize what shoplifters steal
- There is a shoplifting theft every five seconds of every day
- Shoplifting accounts for 30% of all reported crime
- One-third of all new businesses fail due to retail theft
Now add to all these figures the fact that the Justice Department estimates that employee theft — not shoplifting, but employee theft — costs another $5 to $10 billion annually! At the bottom line, let's remember as customers: store security adds something in excess of 10 percent to all the prices we pay for all the goods and services we buy.
Therefore, people who are shoplifting are not shoplifting from big, impersonal stores of brick and mortar. They are stealing from all of us, and you and I are paying the bill every day in higher prices for the purchases we make. Thus, as the saying goes, "No ifs ands or buts about it, SHOPLIFTING IS STEALING!"
(Tom Butenhoff is a First Vice President with J. E. Liss & Company in Milwaukee. The views are his and not necessarily those of Liss Financial Services or the Job Connection/Hiring Network.)