Organized Retail Crime (ORC)

Jay Mealing is the typical Walmart Cinderella story. He started in the Garden Center as an hourly associate in 1990 at a store in Columbia, South Carolina. Almost 30 years later, he is senior director of global security for Walmart International. Not bad for a country boy from South Carolina. Read his story.

Based on their very nature, flash mob robberies are hard to prevent. But it’s critical that all retailers train their employees to be aware and alert to the possibility, to not engage the mob in any way, to concentrate on remembering descriptions of perpetrators and vehicles, and to call the police as soon as it’s safe. Here are 10 ways to protect employees and customers in a flash mob event.

The Loss Prevention Retail Council recently launched it's latest initiate called LPRC Innovate. LPM contributor Tony D'Onofrio was there and provides details on his latest blog post. He also summaries two LPRC research surveys. One on self-checkout theft and a second on theft by opioid-abuse offenders.

Immediately following the conclusion of their ninth annual training conference in Myrtle Beach last year, the board of directors for the national Coalition of...

Tom Meehan, CFI recently completed his first book-length publication titled "Evolution of Retail Asset Protection: Protecting Your Profit in a Digital Age."

Theft, fraud, and losses from other retail “shrink” totaled $50.6 billion in 2018, up from $46.8 billion the year before.

The crime of shoplifting is as old as shopping itself. The first documented cases of shoplifting took place in 16th-century London and involved groups of men called “lifters” (early organized retail crime?).

Almost 100 flea markets were randomly selected from a guide of 1,000 locations and visited by our teams to assess the availability, pricing, and condition of a high-loss men’s shaving product as example of flea markets and stolen products activity.

Contemporary loss prevention professionals still maintain responsibility for retail security. But they also must handle employee theft issues, data protection, safety and risk management, inventory audits, legal compliance, and matters related to organized retail crime and fraud.

There is little consensus on what constitutes “loss” within the retail world nor how it should be measured. The terms “shrinkage” and “shortage” have been loosely applied to encapsulate some of the areas that generate loss, but they are not terms enjoying a clear and agreed-upon definition across the sector.