The 2008 National Retail Security Survey - Highlights
The University of Florida has issued their annual National Retail Security Survey, and it is not a surprise that inventory shrinkage continues. As in years past, the overwhelming cause is not attributed to vendor, administrative or paper errors. Instead, theft continues to be the driving force behind retail inventory shrinkage, at 78.3% of all shrink in 2008, (Of that portion, 42.7% is attributed to employee theft and 35.6% is attributed to shoplifters).
On the brighter side, this year’s survey does reveal that out of the last 17 years, 2008’s overall shrinkage rate of 1.51% is the second lowest since 1991 (with the lowest being 2007’s rate of 1.44%). Though we can hope that inventory shrinkage will continue on the downward trend, many feel that is unlikely as the 2009 economy may contribute to a higher theft rate in the 2009 survey.
Please look over this website and see how the NRMA is your best solution to combating the retail industries’ largest contributor to inventory shrinkage. Just look over our testimonials and ask us for more information. Our current members will attest to the measurable results they experience as a direct correlation to their part in using and contributing to the NRMA retail theft database.
Below are some additional helpful figures
pulled from this year’s NRSS report.
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According to the 2008 National Retail Security Survey conducted by Dr. Richard Hollinger at the University of Florida:
- This year’s shrinkage rate of 1.51% translates into $36.3 billion in annual loss ($15.5 billion to employee theft and $12.9 billion to shoplifters) from the 106 corporate retail chains that participated in this year’s survey
- Of those surveyed, the retail markets averaging more shrink than the average amount of 1.51% included Optical, Children’s Apparel, Strip Mall Centers, Women’s Apparel, Discount Stores, Crafts & Hobbies, Men’s & Women’s Apparel as well as Entertainment/Media/Games/Video/Music retailers
- Beyond employee theft and shoplifting, the remaining segments of shrink were 15.4% administrative error, 3.7% vendor fraud and 3.9% to “unknown” errors
- The top five market sectors for employee theft included Shoes (58.8%), Drug Stores (54.5%), Entertainment/Media/Games/Video/Music (50%), Women’s Apparel (48.2%) and Household Furnishings & House Wares (47.5%)
- Drug stores had one of the lowest averages of overall shrink but was alternatively one of the highest for rate of employee theft
- The five market sectors with the least amount of employee theft included Furniture (25%), Consumer Electronics/Computers/Appliances (32.5%), Accessories (35%), Books/Magazines/Music (35%) and Discount Stores (36.3%)
- While shrink has consistently gone down over recent years, the annual budget in Loss Prevention departments has steadily decreased as well. 0.34% of retailer’s 2007 annual sales was dedicated to LP rather than almost 0.5% in previous years.
- An average of 0.99% of all shrink was attributed to financial (non-merchandise) losses. (i.e. cash theft, check fraud, credit card fraud, refund fraud and Internet fraud).
Note: 14.4% of Employee Theft cases involved assistance from non-employees or ORC (Organized Retail Crime).
Click here to download an Adobe Acrobat version of the 2008 National Retail Security Survey: Final Report.
Warning: This file is password protected. Please send an email to Dr. Hollinger (rhollin@crim.ufl.edu) with your name, title, address, and company and he will email you the password allowing you to open the file.
