A Retail Crime Mystery
Why Are Reported Shopliftings Rising While Thefts Fall?

Trying to untangle a crime data mystery.

Working with crime data is challenging and those challenges are multiplied when trying to tell a coherent story about retail theft. The biggest hurdle to effectively analyzing thefts is the simple fact that just 1 in 4 thefts gets successfully reported to law enforcement per the most recent National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS).

Moreover, retailers have a hard time measuring what products are simply lost vs what projects are stolen from internal sources (employees) and external sources (shoplifters). The National Retail Foundation (NRF) stopped publishing its annual report on retail shrink after FY 2022, further increasing the challenge to understanding this issue.

One thing is obvious — reported theft is falling in the United States. This is clearly seen in the Real-Time Crime Index sample of more than 420 agencies reporting theft data through May. It should come as no surprise that thefts are falling in 2025 given that they have been declining steadily for most of the last 35 years (excluding the post-pandemic jump).

Reported thefts are falling, but reported shoplifting is generally rising — especially in big cities with available data. You may not be surprised by this because rising retail theft has seemingly been in the news (with or without supporting data) for years now despite what the CNN article said. It also may not have been surprising to you because the title to this piece spoiled the surprise. But it was surprising to me.

To see this trend I grabbed data from 13 big cities with publicly available NIBRS data through May 2025.

These graphs start in 2023 to work in the NIBRS transition which took hold in 2021 in some of these cities (Chicago, for example, didn’t start NIBRS until mid-2021). Also, COVID did weird things to property crimes that had mostly worked their way through by then. Also, 2023 is a generally common date of available data for all of the agencies. What’s clear is that reported shopliftings are generally gently rising in all of these cities, especially compared to the end of 2022/early 2023. jasher.substack.com

Ohio Expands Regional ORC Task Forces
New retail theft task force seeks to follow money trail
Northwest Ohio is serving as the prototype for what could become a series of regional task forces across the state targeting organized retail theft sprees and following the trail back to the heart of the enterprise behind them.

“The task force’s purpose is to try to get to where the stolen items are taken, to go after the people behind the organization — large syndicates, gangsters — where the property is being fenced,” Wood County Sheriff Mark Wasylyshyn said.

House Bill 366 — dubbed the Fight Organized Retail Crime and Empower Law Enforcement, or FORCE, Act — passed at the end of last session and took effect in April.

It created the Organized Retail Theft Task Force within Ohio’s existing Organized Crime Investigations Commission, and doubles the filing fee for a sales tax vendor license to $50. A legislative analysis predicts that this will raise $751,000 a year that would be directed to task force operations.

A northwest Ohio version of the task force — currently involving Wood and Lucas counties and some local communities — is now in operation and has made its first arrests. It is looking to gradually expand to incorporate most of the region and then hopes it will be duplicated in four other areas of the state.

“People are traveling up [I-75] heading to Michigan or heading to to other parts of Ohio and other states,” said Rep. Haraz Ghanbari (R., Perrysburg), the law’s sponsor. “They’re traveling down the turnpike which is based in proximity to big box stores. ... They’re stealing items, repurposing items online, selling on different platforms.”

“The biggest question that needs to be asked is where is this money going once they sell these items,” he said. “It’s going back into bigger retail crime — human trafficking, sex trafficking, drug trafficking, and other criminal activity.” toledoblade.com
 

California's Investment in Public Safety Continues
State Welcomes 130 New CHP Officers as California Crime Rates Drop
In a ceremony held in West Sacramento, Governor Gavin Newsom welcomed 130 new officers into the California Highway Patrol following their graduation from the CHP Academy. The cadets completed an intensive 26-week training program that prepared them for service across the state, starting August 11.

Since 2019, the state has invested $1.7 billion in public safety efforts. In 2023, Governor Newsom rolled out California’s most aggressive plan yet to combat organized retail crime, including increased operations in cities like Oakland, Bakersfield, and San Bernardino. Regional crime suppression efforts in Alameda, Kern, and San Bernardino counties have already seen success.

Recent data from the California Department of Justice shows statewide crime continues to decline. Violent and property crimes, including homicides and vehicle thefts, dropped in 2024. The homicide rate is now the second lowest since 1966, and stolen vehicle rates dropped by 13% compared to 2023. newsbreak.com

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The Evolution of Retail Tech
Amazon's Quiet Retreat from 'Just Walk Out' Isn’t the End

By the D&D Daily staff

In the latest chapter of Amazon’s ever-evolving retail experiment, the company has quietly pulled its high-profile Just Walk Out technology from its Amazon Fresh grocery stores in the U.S. Once hailed as the future of frictionless shopping, the system used cameras, sensors, and AI to let customers grab items and leave without stopping at a register — no scanning, no cashiers, no waiting.

Now, Amazon is shifting toward smart shopping carts and more traditional self-checkout models. The reason? Technical complexity, high operating costs, and customer confusion. Despite the bold promise, Just Walk Out required human oversight behind the scenes. In fact, reports revealed a significant portion of transactions still had to be verified manually — often from workers based in India — raising questions about scalability and real-time accuracy.

But this isn’t a failure story. It’s a recalibration.

Amazon’s retreat from Just Walk Out offers a valuable lesson for the broader retail world: even cutting-edge tech must be practical, intuitive, and cost-effective. For loss prevention professionals, the episode reinforces that while automation can reduce human error and opportunity for theft, it’s no silver bullet. Tech is only as effective as its deployment, monitoring, and customer experience.

Interestingly, Amazon isn’t abandoning its data-driven ambitions. It continues to expand its Amazon One palm payment tech, roll out smart carts with built-in sensors, and refine its in-store analytics — all of which have major implications for asset protection. The real win might not be in eliminating checkout, but in giving retailers unprecedented visibility into shopper behavior, high-risk zones, and operational blind spots.

For retailers, the message is clear: Don’t chase the flashiest solution. Invest in the systems that strike the right balance between innovation, reliability, and risk mitigation. Amazon may have walked out on Just Walk Out, but its next move could reshape retail all over again.


80K Retail Job Cuts So Far in 2025
Retail job cuts spike nearly 250% from last year

A Challenger, Gray & Christmas report points to tariffs and broader economic uncertainty as the catalysts driving a retail workforce contraction.

U.S. employers in the retail industry announced 80,487 job cuts through July, a 249% surge compared to the same period last year, according to an analysis from Challenger, Gray & Christmas released Thursday.

Across industries, U.S. companies announced 806,383 job cuts so far this year, the highest year-to-date total since employers reduced their workforce by 1.85 million workers in 2020. In July alone, employers cut their workforce by more than 62,000, a 29% jump from June, the report said. Year over year, the cuts have risen 140%.

The report furthers a trend from previous months this year. U.S. retailers shed nearly 76,000 jobs in the first five months of this year, a 274% jump from a year earlier, according to a previous Challenger, Gray & Christmas report released in June.

As the retail job market contracts, the analysis found companies in the sector also have not released hiring plans this year to date — a noteworthy development given that the holiday season is around the corner. Tariffs, inflation and economic uncertainty have prompted retailers to close stores and lay off employees, the report said.

Indeed, multiple major retailers have shuttered locations amid broader corporate restructurings. Between 2024 and February 2025, retailers closed more than 9,900 stores, but they only opened 7,700 locations during that period, a JLL analysis found. retaildive.com


Did Tariffs Cause iPhone Panic Buying?
Apple saw an 'unusual buying pattern' among US shoppers this year. Tim Cook explains what happened.

The panic buying drove strong iPhone sales and pushed Apple's Q3 revenue to $94 billion.

CEO Tim Cook told investors on Thursday that an "unusual buying pattern" for iPhones and Macs in the US that started in April led to an "incredible" quarter of sales for Apple. Consumers rushed to upgrade their devices ahead of potential price hikes they feared could come from tariffs.

Sales of the newest iPhone 16 lineup grew by double digits compared to the iPhone 15 model from the quarter a year ago, while Mac updates "set records," Cook said as the company reported earnings. "People buying because of discussions about tariffs" drove one percentage point of Apple's 10% year-over-year growth during its third quarter, he said.

The threat of President Donald Trump's tariff war loomed large in April. Tariff rates on goods from China, where Apple manufactures many of its phones, spiked amid the escalating trade war and prompted concerns that the company could raise prices.

Some people went to their local Apple store for an upgrade to avoid potentially paying more later. The result was "tariff-related pull ahead and demand" for iPhone 16 models and Macs, CFO Kevan Parekh told investors Thursday. businessinsider.com


More Tariff Changes This Week
US to install country-specific tariffs

The National Retail Federation said the higher levies “will hurt Americans” and “impact merchandise in the coming weeks” for retailers.

The U.S. plans to lift its pause on country-specific tariffs while implementing a range of new rates for specific trading partners on Thursday, per an executive order President Donald Trump signed last week.

The order lists rates for over 60 trading partners, ranging from 10% to 41%. The list includes levies for countries that match the rates included in a series of trade-related agreements Trump has announced over the last several months. The order also implements a 25% tariff on imports from India that Trump threatened earlier in the week.

Tariffs on imports from Canada, Mexico and China will continue to incur separate duties, while goods from countries not listed in the order will face a baseline 10% levy. The National Retail Federation on Friday issued a statement asking the Trump administration to lower tariffs to encourage open markets. retaildive.com


New ISCPO Episode
Season 2025 Episode 3 “ISCPO & TAT – Driving Out Human Trafficking”

In this ⁠ISCPO⁠ episode, Byron Smith hosts Heather Fry and Rod Fulenwider to discuss the ongoing fight against human trafficking and the education/training around the dilemma. ⁠TAT (Truckers Against Trafficking) ⁠works with more than 1,390 trucking companies and supply chain organizations to train their staff to recognize and report human trafficking. All training is free and can be accomplished in 30 minutes.

- Host: ⁠Byron Smith⁠, ISCPO President/Chairman
- Speaker: ⁠Heather Fry⁠, TAT Director of Industry Training
- Speaker: ⁠Rod Fulenwider⁠, ISCPO Board Director & VP at D&L Protective Services

Click here to watch


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