Tariffs and the Security Industry: 25% Hike Coming
Here's What You Need to Know & How to Prepare
It's nervous time in the security and custom electronics (CE) industries. Just as installing security contractors, CE integrators and manufacturers find themselves basking in the strong economy and growing consumer awareness, increased tariffs proposed by President Trump against China could have a major dampening effect on everyone's business.

Manufacturers who source products from China have already been hit by tariff increases ranging from 10% to 25%, but the looming tariff proposed for Jan. 1, 2019, is another knee-buckling 25% increase that would hit a much broader swath of Chinese-sourced products.

The Security Industry Association detailed member concerns back in September about the potential for impact to numerous security wares that are widely imported, including video surveillance cameras, alarm products, access control components, and fire/life-safety gear such as smoke detectors.

Vendors are actively exploring how to come up with potential solutions, ranging from negotiating with their contract factories to absorb some of the price increases, ramping up production through the end of 2018, moving factories outside China, and petitioning for exemptions with the United States government.

For dealers and integrators, the blow is not quite has hard as it is to manufacturers, but still could represent a significant portion of their profits. Some dealers report they are already seeing the surcharges from vendors but have yet to react to the inflation. securitysales.com

Extortion emails carrying bomb threats cause panic across the US
Police tell Americans to stay calm
US law enforcement authorities are urging Americans to remain calm after a massive spam campaign carrying bomb threats has scared people and caused building evacuations all day across the country.
 
The source of all problems is a spam campaign that got underway Thursday, and which was sent to millions of email inboxes, primarily in the US.
 
The emails had different subject lines and various text variations, but all carried the same threat. Extortionists threatened to blow up a person's workplace or building unless the person paid the equivalent of $20,000 in Bitcoin to a specified Bitcoin address. A screengrab of one of these emails is available here.
 
The emails are obviously fake. Since May, there's been a rash of email extortion campaigns, carrying different themes, but mostly using the classic "sextortion" scheme. But while security researchers are aware that these types of emails are just false threats, most Americans are not.
 
Throughout the day, there have been bomb threats reported to authorities all over the US, and local police were forced to evacuate buildings and send bomb squads to investigate.
 
Universities, schools, media organizations, courthouses, and private businesses all reported receiving the bomb threats. Public institutions were evacuated as a precaution, disrupting the activity of municipalities all over the US. zdnet.com

Paris Police preparing for 5th weekend of violent protests
Survey shows French protests knocked business
A survey suggests the "yellow vest" protests in France have dealt a significant blow to business activity in the country's services sector, which includes tourism and retail. Eliot Kerr, economist at IHS Markit, said the data points to "an outright contraction in France's private sector for the first time in two-and-a-half years, following the protests which have swept through the country in recent weeks."

Anticipating a fifth straight weekend of violent protests, Paris' police chief says armored vehicles and thousands of officers will be deployed again in the French capital on Saturday. Michel Delpuech told RTL radio on Friday security services intend to deploy the same numbers and strength as last weekend, with about 8,000 officers and 14 armored vehicles again in Paris. msn.com

'No one would ever tolerate that'
Under Armour CEO says about employees expensing strip club visits
Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank says he wants to build a "diverse" and "inclusive" company, following a report earlier this year that exposed that the company had been letting its employees charge visits to strip clubs on their corporate cards.

"No one would ever tolerate that," Plank told CNBC's Sara Eisen on Thursday morning, on the heels of Under Armour's annual meeting with investors. "I want to make sure that I set the record straight on that."

The practice of letting workers expense strip club visits to win over athletes was stopped in February, though it had been happening for years, The Wall Street Journal reported last month. Meanwhile, two of Under Armour's top executives were reportedly ousted recently after reviews of their credit card charges. cnbc.com

Audit Alert: Whistleblower Lawsuit & Investigated by DCIS
U.S. Sues Roadway Express & Yellow Transportation - Systematic Overcharging
The United States has filed a complaint in the Western District of New York against YRC Freight Inc., (YRC); Roadway Express Inc. (Roadway); and Yellow Transportation Inc. (Yellow), alleging that these companies systematically overcharged the government for freight carrier services and made false statements to the government that hid their misconduct, the Justice Department announced today.

Specifically, the United States' lawsuit alleges that the defendants reweighed thousands of shipments and suppressed the results whenever they indicated that a shipment was actually lighter than its original estimated weight. Thus, instead of charging the Department of Defense for shipments based on the correct weight, the defendants knowingly billed the government (and their other customers) based on weights that they knew to be inflated. The defendants also allegedly made false statements to induce the Department of Defense to use them as freight carriers and further knowingly made or used false statements to improperly avoid their obligations to correct inflated invoices and return overpayments. justice.gov

Did a slave make your sneakers? The answer is: probably
Largest Sector Guilty - $3 Trillion Apparel & Footwear Industry
Adidas, Lululemon, and Gap had the most slavery-free supply chains
Prada, Hermes, and Louis Vuitton fared poorly on a new report about forced labor.

The truth is that slave labor is still alive and well. And a new report produced by the nonprofit KnowTheChain points out that your closet is likely full of clothes made through forced labor.

Today's slave labor doesn't look the way it did a hundred years ago. Instead, it involves poor people in developing countries trying to find work at clothing and shoe factories and finding themselves exploited.

Few of us have any idea about the misery, exploitation, and forced labor that go into the clothes we wear every day.

Across the world, an estimated 24.9 million people are victims of forced labor. The lion's share of them-16 million people-are exploited by companies for a profit, rather than by private individuals, such as in the case of sex trafficking. And according to KnowTheChain's report, one of the largest sectors that relies on forced labor is the $3 trillion apparel and footwear industry. An estimated 60 million to 75 million people are employed in this global sector. And while most of us realize that these workers are paid very little, the reality is that some are not paid at all.

All of this suggests that we, as consumers, have a role to play in helping to reduce modern slavery. We need to hold companies to task for their their lack of oversight. This might mean writing to them, or using social media to hold their feet to their fire. And it also means supporting brands that are known to have better practices.  fastcompany.com

Editor's Note: This is exactly the type of practice that newly promoted Keith White at the Gap will be monitoring and its great to se the Gap on the list as most slave-free supply chain.

The Easiest Inside Scam - Is Anyone Auditing Ads?
Logistics Dir of Recruiting Executive Gets 5 Yrs. - For $461k Fake Advertising Expenses
According to court documents, in 2014 and 2015, John Kelly, 62 of Columbus, OH., was employed at two different trucking logistics companies - CEVA Logistics and Container Port Group, Inc. During that time, Kelly defrauded the two companies by causing them to pay for bogus advertising expenditures from a pair of sham companies that Kelly set up for his own gain. Kelly billed the trucking companies more than half a million dollars for advertising services that were never actually provided. Instead, he took the payments and used them to pay personal expenses. He caused an actual loss of $461,000 from CEVA and CPG. justice.gov

Retail - The Least Trusted Industry
Study: Store checkout areas becoming 'less necessary'
Handheld Mobile Devices - Electronic Shelves - Automated Front Ends
52% of retail decision makers are converting point-of-sale space to self-checkout, and 62% are transforming it for online order pickup.

Zebra Technologies Corp. "11th Annual Global Shopper Study". North American Findings:

In the U.S. alone, a mere 11% of shoppers completely trust retailers to protect their personal data, the lowest level of trust in any surveyed vertical industry, including healthcare, financial institutions and technology companies.

● Nearly seven in 10 store associates (68 percent) reported that electronic shelf-labels would have a positive impact on the customer experience, and 54 percent of surveyed shoppers are likely to read them.

● Nearly 60% of retailers plan to increase their spend on handheld mobile computers by more than 6%, and more than one-in-five retailers (21%) plan to spend greater than 10% on rugged tablets over the next three years. Only 49% of store associates are comfortable with the idea of fully-automated front-end models. chainstoreage.com

McKinsey Global Survey
The New CFO Mandate: Prioritize, Transform, Repeat
Finance chiefs are uniquely positioned to resolved differing points of view and lead substantive change for their companies: McKinsey research.

In the two years since our previous survey on the topic, CFOs say the number of functions reporting to them has risen from about four to more than six.

What's more, the share of CFOs saying they oversee their companies' digital activities has doubled during that time. And many finance leaders say they are being asked to resolve issues in areas that are relatively new to them while continuing to mind traditional responsibilities, such as risk management, that remain business priorities.

Responses indicate that the opportunity for CFOs to establish the finance function as both a leading change agent and a source of competitive advantage has never been greater. Yet they also show a clear perception gap that must be bridged if CFOs are to break down silos and foster the collaboration necessary to succeed in a broader role.

The survey results point to three ways that CFOs are uniquely positioned to lead substantive change: actively heading up transformations, leading the charge toward digitization, and building the talent and capabilities required to sustain complex transformations within and outside the finance function. cfo.com

NYC is Reeling About the Amazon Deal - Angry Politicians
Increases in Traffic - Rising Rents - Workforce Shortages
Members of the City Council in New York spent three hours this week vilifying Amazon for its decision to bring half its second headquarters and 25,000 jobs to Long Island City.

Meanwhile in northern Virginia, not a single politician has spoken against the company's plan to put the other half of that headquarters and 25,000 jobs in Crystal City.

Critics decry the fact New York's subsidy to Amazon is much bigger than Virginia's. There are so many ways to figure the value of incentives but a reasonable one from the Washington Post calculated New York tax credits at $48,000 per new job, while Virginia agreed to workforce cash grants of $22,000 per job.

New York incentives could reach some $3 billion. Virginia and Arlington County offered direct subsidies of $573 million and another $223 million for transportation improvements. The state also is planning to spend an additional $1.1 billion on tech education, much of it very close to Crystal City. crainsnewyork.com

Editor's Note: Brilliant Tactic - Bundle It & Pit Every City Against Each Other - Then, Split it Up and Save Millions
Tell me Bezos didn't plan this chess move and played all the Cities in the U.S. Gotta give him credit. He pulled off probably one of the biggest and best real estate deals ever.

 

Holiday Sales Report Mid-Point
NRF Forecast 4.3 to 4.8%

Does fear motivate workers or make things worse?
Research shows that, as tools for motivating workers, fear and intimidation come with a lot of risk and have been largely discredited for some time. And yet the use of fear as a motivator persists.

"Fear is a normal human emotion, and - when held in check - can sometimes be a functional or even necessary way to ensure that people do not become complacent," said Wharton management professor Andrew Carton. "But when fear becomes an entrenched marker of an organization's culture, it can have toxic effects over the long run. In addition to stifling creativity, it can inhibit collaboration and lead to burnout."

Burnout may be of little concern for some employers, especially in certain high-growth industries.

Beyond anxiety and depression, fear-based work environments have been found to inhibit learning, drive workers to become rigid and less creative, and impact team cohesiveness. retailwire.com

Does Fear Motivate Workers - or Make Things Worse? - Knowledge@Wharton

Aventura, FL: Family of teen shoplifter sues Bloomingdale's over LP Officer's tackle
A South Florida family has filed a lawsuit against Bloomingdale's and one of their security guards after the guard tackled a 13-year-old girl at the Aventura Mall branch on suspicion of shoplifting, but police records show that may not have been the case.

Surveillance video from the Feb. 10 incident shows the female security guard approaching the teen at the top of an escalator outside of the store and pushing her to the ground as she held a shopping back in her right hand.

According to police records and the lawsuit filed by the teen's family, Jamie Stubbs, a Bloomingdale's loss prevention officer, followed the girl out of the store and took her down atop the escalator. Her mother described the incident as a brutal beatdown. wsvn.com


D&D Daily's 2018 Year in Review - Coming Next Week

Stay tuned to the Daily next week as we share our most-read news articles from the past year, top LP/AP jobs posted, biggest crime cases reported, and more!


Amazon aims at office workers with compact cashier-less food store

McDonald's Global Safety Director position no longer listed

Starbucks expands delivery to 2,000 stores via UberEats


Quarterly Results
Costco Q3 comp's up 8.8%, U.S. comp's up 11%, Canadian comp's up 5.5% adjusted, net sales up 10.3%
Sears Holdings Q3 Sears comp's up 3.2%, Kmart comp's up 6.1%, total revenue down 23.5%
Fred's Q3 comp's down 5.3%, net sales down 5.5%