LPRC Tests Retail Theft Solutions
Inside America’s Shoplifting Lab

In the war on “shrink,” big retailers are turning to one Florida outfit to study shoppers and prevent them from stealing. I went there—and saw far too much.

Dr. Hayes is the executive director of the Loss Prevention Research Council and the steward of America’s leading lab to prevent shoplifting, located in muggy Gainesville, Florida. It’s not just Justin’s, the simulated store, with its unparalleled density of anti-shoplifting technologies. Dr. Hayes has made all of campus’s Innovation Square into a live testing ground. Even the surrounds are landscaped with solar-powered towers running cameras, detectors, and more. Also, there is Spanish moss.

Dr. Hayes is best known as the man who brought the scientific method to shoplifting studies—no ideology, just cold, hard facts and figures. Nowhere is there a higher concentration of theft-thwarting tech and thief-busting research. The LPRC does it all: It gathers the reports, it tests out the technology, it grills the criminals, and it recommends the solutions. It even produces the data that says there’s a problem in the first place.

All this not a moment too soon, because America, as we all know, is in the midst of a shoplifting crisis.

On one wall hung the names of the “Innovate Advisory Panel,” the most active retail participants. On the adjoining wall hung the names of the “solution partners,” the companies that make the loss-prevention tech on display in the lab, the new-age weaponry in the war on “shrink,” the industry’s preferred coinage for the problem. There were 171 of those, also dues-paying. Plus, now, restaurants. At last count, there were over 200,000 stores in the LPRC’s fast-growing private-policing network.

Dr. Hayes walked me through the bow tie model: Shoplifters, on the road to stealing, progress through a color-coded countdown to crime. Zone 5, he told me, the far left of the bow tie, represented “the parking lot, or even online.” That was midnight blue. Zone 4 was in front of the store. It was navy or so. Zone 3 was inside the store. Cerulean, let’s say. Zone 2 was in the aisle, soft blue. And Zone 1, that was crime time. It was gray. It was also called “at bang.” The right side of the bow tie—Reds 2, 3, 4, and 5—were the same stages in reverse, as the criminal takes the item from shelf to aisle to store to the parking lot and home.

5, 4, 3, 2—1, crime, bang—then 2, 3, 4, 5. The left the approach, the right the escape. Nine zones in all. “Affect. Detect. Connect,” read the bow tie sticker.

Dr. Hayes helped found the LPRC in 2000 to attempt to solve many problems afflicting loss prevention. One such problem was the lack of distinction in the space. While the top criminologists were being spirited away by the allure of cracking white-collar crime, which paid more, no one wanted to do the yeoman’s work of stopping boosters, which, at least at the entry level, married life-threatening risk with near-minimum-wage pay. slate.com
 

Australia's Retail Crime Wave
Retail crime is now estimated to cost Australian businesses $9 billion each year
Retailers across Australia are facing an escalating wave of crime, with industry estimates suggesting theft, property damage and associated security costs now exceed $9 billion annually. What was once considered an occasional operational issue has today become an economic and public safety concern, affecting retailers of every size across the country.

While some industries are hit more than others, businesses across the board are reporting higher levels of shoplifting, organised theft, aggressive customer behaviour and violence against staff. As a result, retailers are investing more heavily in technology, training and security services in Melbourne and other major Australian cities to better protect people and inventory.

Alongside this, as retail crime continues to rise locally and across the state, governments, industry groups and retailers are working to identify practical solutions that improve safety while reducing the growing economic burden on Australian businesses. Let’s take a look at the issue and potential solutions.

Retail Crime Continues to Rise Across Australia

Recent industry data and government crime statistics indicate that retail theft has increased significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic. Many retailers have reported more frequent incidents involving repeat offenders, organised retail crime groups and increasingly confrontational behaviour toward retail employees.

Industry organisations have warned that the problem extends beyond opportunistic shoplifting, too. Organised criminal groups are increasingly targeting high-value products including cosmetics, alcohol, electronics, luxury goods, baby formula and over-the-counter medications, often stealing large quantities for resale through online marketplaces or illicit distribution networks. Alongside this, frontline retail workers are experiencing greater levels of verbal abuse, intimidation and physical assault when attempting to intervene. kyfreepress.com.au


Is Shame an Effective Shoplifting Deterrent?
Harger: Washington leads the nation in shoplifting. A 33-officer department in Bonney Lake is trying to do something about it
Washington state now we leads the nation in shoplifting. Washington sees 48% more retail theft than you’d expect from a state our size. That’s the Forbes Advisor analysis that ranked us worst in the country.

Worst. Ahead of every other state. The Washington Retail Association puts the haul in a single recent year at $2.7 billion. Hundreds of millions in sales tax never collected, never paid for anything. Every one of those dollars finds its way back to you. As a price tag. As a locked cabinet. As a store that quietly stops restocking what keeps walking out the door.

But a 33-officer police department in Bonney Lake decided to stop just accepting it. What they’re doing costs nothing, it’s working, and almost nobody else in the state is bothering. They run a Facebook page called Can You ID Crime. Surveillance stills of people they haven’t identified yet, with the date, what got taken, and a tip line.

It works. It costs nothing. It asks nothing of the community except a pair of eyes. Shame only works if the word stings. We spent a decade making sure it doesn’t.

Washington even has a statewide site built for this, called CanYouID.me, where investigators can post photos of people caught on camera they can’t identify. The tool exists. Most departments barely touch it. Meanwhile, we’re the worst in the country for shoplifting, and we have fewer officers per capita than any state in the nation.

Every department in this state has surveillance footage sitting on a hard drive. Every department has a Facebook page. The tool is free. The audience is already there. Bonney Lake is doing it with 33 officers and a tip line. What’s everybody else’s excuse? mynorthwest.com


Theft & Violence Shutters Another Store
Neighborhood grocery store that ended food desert closing; owners cite theft, rising costs
The Country Meat Co. Marketplace, the only full-service grocery store in Avondale, is closing after less than two years in business.

Owners Chanel and Tennel Bryant announced the decision in a social media post, citing rising operating costs, theft, violence in the surrounding area, unmet financial commitments and other financial challenges.

The market opened in February 2025 at Avondale Town Center on Reading Road, becoming the neighborhood's first full-service grocery store since 2008 and helping address a long-standing food desert. The Black-owned business offered fresh produce, meat, take-home meals, a coffee bar and other grocery staples while emphasizing locally sourced products and community engagement. local12.com
 

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