A new report has defined five key areas bricks and mortar retailers can focus on in a bid to improve the bottom line as the COVID recovery for the retail sector increases in momentum.

Artificial Intelligence company Olvin recently released their ‘Retail Statistics, Trends, and Forecasts For 2021’, noting there is exciting opportunity for real-world retail in the years ahead, but only if they capitalise on lessons learned in 2020.

Here’s an insight into what they found…

The fallout from 2020

The road ahead

The retail sector rebounded over the holiday season with record spending also extending into Valentine’s Day and Easter.

That said, Olvin notes around 40 per cent of Americans don’t expect their finances to return to normal until late 2021 or even 2022 and beyond.

Despite this, there is a widespread sense of optimism in the recovery of the economy. Forty-one per cent of people in the US said they were optimistic about the economic future.

And, as a result, 12,200 stores have revised their plans to close.

But how can retailers maximise that optimism and translate it to the opportunity ahead?

Bricks and mortar potential

Olvin said despite a tough 2020, there is hope for the future of real-world retail based on the recent resurgence in both sales and optimism.

But they note it will centre around four key trends emerging post-COVID.

A focus on the consumer

More than ever before, the customer experience will be critical in the months ahead.

“Knowing your customers might be one of the first rules of retail, but after setting up, many businesses lose sight of what their customers want…,” Olvin said.

Ethical activity

The conscious consumer has steadily been shaping retail in recent years. The period ahead sees this trend likely to strengthen.

“The increase in the amount of information that is available about companies means that consumers are also becoming increasingly conscious of the power their purchases have,” Olvin said.

“Customers are not only choosing the products they buy much more consciously, but they are also deciding which businesses they are prepared to buy from much more carefully too.”

Cost-cutting

The retail bottom line is increasingly becoming the differentiator between the stores that thrive and those who fail to survive. And shoring up this bottom line through cost-cutting is essential.

“To remain competitive, retailers are likely to be cutting their costs significantly in 2021 – and will need to do so while keeping the right balance with their ethical credentials,” Olvin noted.

Creative use of space

The traditional bricks and mortar could well be a thing of the past, with retailers reconsidering exactly how they utilise their physical real estate.

That’s seeing an increase in alternative uses of retail space, whether it’s a dispatch outlet, an immersive experience, coffee outlets, or in-store recycling facilities.

The final word

When it comes to where people intend to purchase their Easter-related items, discount stores are the most popular choice, with 43 per cent of survey respondents noting they intended to shop there.

Discount stores are followed by:

• Department stores – 35 per cent.

• Online – 35 per cent (the highest percentage in the survey’s history and up from 28 per cent last year).

• Specialty stores – 23 per cent.

• Small businesses or local stores – 23 per cent.

Meanwhile, as vaccination rates increase, celebrations are also on the rise.

With retail beginning to settle back into its new normal and consumer spending on the increase, attention is turning to getting back to business and boosting the bottom line.

The key to protecting that bottom line is loss prevention, but with a new landscape come new challenges.

Here are five loss prevention challenges the retail sector will be looking to address throughout 2021.

Control versus convenience

An increased focus on omnichannel and strategies like buy online pickup in-store (BOPIS) means control of stock and products now has to be carefully weighed against consumer convenience.

That makes visibility key when it comes to inventory control.

Improved inventory visibility might include:

• Item tracking via RFID.

• A focus on loss prevention such as electronic article surveillance to reduce out-of-stock events.

• Improved data and analytics for accurate insight into stock levels.

Truth is inventory accuracy has always been a major factor in loss prevention, with human error, fraud, and theft all undermining a store’s ability to keep track of its stock.

As trends like BOPIS and omnichannel are set to stay, this accuracy and control are now more important than ever.

Customer interaction

With retail foot traffic still lower than in years gone by, bricks and mortar is looking to play to its strength of allowing customers to touch, try, feel and interact with products.

Again, this requires a fine balance of allowing customers access to products while also ensuring these items are protected against theft.

Meanwhile, enticing displays are becoming a priority as retailers seek to find more ways to lure potential customers into their outlets.

So how can you protect products, while still guarding them against shoplifting and theft?

Loss prevention methods include:

• Product-based security measures including security tags and labels.

• Lockable glass cabinets.

• Alarmed and tethered displays for products like electronics.

• Good store layout.

• Staff education and training.

Supply chain accountability

Securing the supply chain continues to be key to mitigating retail loss. This has become increasingly important in the past 12 months due to the shipment and manufacturing delays that have occurred over the past year.

The upshot is, store management now requires greater supply chain accountability to ensure the products that are on order are traced and ticked off when they arrive.

Tools like RFID, which offers 99.9 percent supply chain accuracy can assist.

Remote insight

With remote working still very much on the agenda and travel fairly limited, remote insight into a store’s operation including its sales, revenue and loss is a continuing priority for store management.

That’s where tools like mPOS, cloud-based analytics, and inventory tracking methods like RFID are coming into play, allowing retail management remote insight into the operation of one outlet or a chain of stores.

Staff safety

Between protests, riots, and health fears, staff safety remains a major priority for all retailers. Although necessary, safety focus does have an impact on loss prevention, with staff often at the frontline when it comes to identifying loss and theft.

As a result, loss prevention tools and technology will play an increasingly important role in the fight against shoplifting, theft, and miscellaneous loss.

To learn more about trends shaping the retail landscape in 2021, see here. Alternatively, you can order your security tags and labels directly here.

Electronic Article Surveillance remains one of the most effective and popular tools in the fight against retail theft.

Employing security tags, security labels, and antenna that monitor the tags, it is renowned as the most comprehensive way to protect stock at a product-based level, reducing eternal theft by between 60 and 80 per cent.

But like any loss prevention tool, EAS effectiveness is impacted by the way it’s deployed and how well staff is trained in using the system.

With that in mind, here’s a quick guide on EAS best practices to reduce theft…

The right tag or label

For retailers drawing on the power of EAS, it’s critical they select the right security tag or the correct security label for the product they’re looking to protect.

These days security tags and labels are available in both AM and RF frequencies, while tags come in different shapes, sizes, and magnetic strengths.

You can gain a full insight into selecting the right security tags for your store here and learn more about the different types of labels and their uses here.

But to put it briefly:

• Apparel is best protected using clothing tags with a minimum superlock strength.

• Accessories like handbags and sports shoes are generally protected with security tags that attach via lanyard or cable.

• High-volume, low-value items like perfumes are best protected with labels.

• Specialist tags are available for products including golf clubs, liquor, eyewear, and baby formula.

Position matters

Where the security tag or label is positioned on a product matters for a whole host of reasons.

Uniform positioning allows a store to be more visually appealing, while consistent positioning also assists with tag removal and label deactivation at the Point of Sale.

Security tags

Security tags should be positioned so as not to interfere with the customer’s experience of a product.

At the same time, tags should also be situated in place which is obvious enough to deter theft and ensure anyone attempting to pull them off will cause significant damage to a product, rendering it useless.

Security labels and stickers

The ideal position for a security label is near the barcode. This position allows for quick deactivation and maximum efficiency at the Point of Sale.

When it comes to best practices, retailers should have a store guide and policies regarding the tag and label positioning to ensure consistency throughout a retail outlet.

Easy label deactivation and tag detachment

While labels are deactivated using a deactivator that breaks a circuit within the label, security tags need to be detached using a tag detacher.

Security tag detachers and label deactivators are best positioned at the Point of Sale, allowing for easy tag removal and label deactivation.

Tag detachers can be built into the countertop or affixed to it, while deactivators can be mounted to the counter, concealed beneath it, or incorporated into barcode scanning equipment.

Retailers should ensure these detachers and deactivators are easily accessible to staff, and there are enough to service all Points of Sale.

Meanwhile, deactivators should be checked to ensure they are powered and working each day as part of a store’s opening protocols.

Minimize false alarms

If your store experiences false EAS alarms, it desensitizes staff to the real risk of an item being shoplifted.

In order to minimize false alarms:

• Your EAS antenna system should be tested daily.

• Staff should be made aware of the ‘no-tag’ zone (between the antenna and a 6ft region around it).

• Staff should be educated on tag pollution.

• Staff should be trained in tag detaching and label deactivation.

You can read more about minimizing false EAS alarms here.

Understand the clues

If you find items are being shoplifted even with an EAS system in place, there are generally clues to areas that need improvement.

For example, if you find tags removed and discarded in store, it indicates one or a couple of the following:

• Insufficient magnetic strength.

• Incorrect tag type for the product being protected.

• Inadequate tag pin size.

We have a helpful further guide to troubleshooting tag security here

The final word

EAS remains one of the most effective security tools in the fight against retail theft. But like anything, it can benefit from honing and improving over time.

If you’re looking to improve your EAS system, you can view our range of security tags here, and labels here.

The point of sale is a key weapon in the fight against shoplifting. As the place where transactions are made and staff are based, it provides the central location to not only identify retail loss but to actively combat it.

With that in mind here are six ways to stop shoplifting using the point of sale.

Location, location

The point of sale is among the most important focal points of any retail outlet, and its location alone can help combat theft.

The POS should be positioned so staff have a clear line of sight across the shop floor. In larger outlets, registers should be near the door to ensure customers coming in and out are observed in a welcoming manner.

Meanwhile, self-service registers should fall under the watchful gaze of a dedicated attendant.

Analytics and insight

A great asset of the modern-day Point of Sale is that it reveals a wealth of data relating to loss prevention.

For example, it can tell management when a store is most likely to be busy, which staff member handled what transactions, and what items are meant to be in stock, but cannot actually be located on the shop floor.

It also reveals information about returns and refunds.

Together this paints a picture of where your retail loss is occurring, providing clues as to whether that’s due to employee theft, fraudulent returns, or shoplifting of specific items.

Gift cards and returns

On that note, the Point of Sale is where transactions including refunds, exchanges and gift card redemptions most commonly occur. And each of these transactions offers the potential for retail theft involving fraud.

Service staff at the register should be well trained in what to look out for when it comes to fraudulent returns and gift cards, along with being made aware of a store’s policies relating to returns without receipts.

EAS strategy

The Point of Sale is integral to loss prevention strategies like electronic article surveillance. After all, this is the site where the security labels and security tags which protect individual products against theft are deactivated or detached.

Staff at the POS are also likely to be among those responding to any EAS alarms.

That means detachers and deactivators should be readily accessible at the Point of Sale, allowing staff to quickly remove tags or deactivate labels as they complete a sales transaction.

Meanwhile, POS staff should also be educated on how EAS works, including proper deactivation and detachment techniques to avoid false alarms and what to do in the advent of an actual alarm.

Identifying suspicious behavior

As the central location that customers attend to make a purchase or an inquiry, the Point of Sale is also among the places in a store where suspicious activity can be quickly identified.

For example, organized gangs of shoplifters will often seek to distract staff at the POS while items are stolen.

It’s also a central position to observe consumer behavior looking for the key signs of shoplifting.

High value stock

Best loss prevention practice indicates high-value stock should be positioned within view or reach of the Point of Sale.

In smaller retailers, this might mean high-value stock is positioned behind the counter, or a display model is available but actual merchandise is locked in a drawer or glass cabinet, accessed by POS staff.

The final word

The role of the Point of Sale in loss prevention is just one factor that retailers should consider when It comes to combatting shoplifting, theft, and organized retail crime.

The right positioning of the POS, the right insight from its analytics, and the right training of POS staff ensure this key feature of all stores can be used to great effect to help reduce shoplifting and theft.

For more tips on loss prevention see here, or view our range of security tags and security labels.