The pandemic has obviously significantly affected businesses of all types and how we go about our work lives as well as how we behave as consumers and shoppers. While the retail industry has been one of the most impacted some sectors such as grocery and big box have fared better than apparel, health, beauty and speciality retail. But regardless of the retail sectors, the job of retail loss prevention professionals has changed significantly in the last few months and some of the changes and new challenges are likely here to stay for the foreseeable future.
To help the profession get a better understanding of the new environment and share insights and best practices as to how retail organizations are responding, Nedap Retail conducted a survey of 100 retail loss professionals in the USA in August and September 2020. We are pleased to share the results in this Industry Report and looking forward to continuing the discussion on how we can jointly address the new challenges.
Topics
In this industry report, the following topics will be discussed.
New responsibilities and challenges for loss prevention professionals
As a result of the pandemic, Loss Prevention (LP) professionals are facing a number of new challenges and have been charged with new responsibilities. The job has changed significantly for many and the great majority is struggling to manage all the responsibilities, especially in an environment where resources and headcount have been cut.
Shrink has gone up
The key metric for loss prevention success has gone up significantly. Of those who have taken inventories, a full 50% of respondents report higher shrink, for 24% it has stayed the same and the remaining 26% reported a decrease. It is also remarkable that fully a third of all respondents had not taken inventories to verify and report shrink.
Best practices for addressing the new challenges
Our survey has confirmed what we’ve known all along – loss prevention professionals are hungry to find out more about best practices and solutions to address the new challenges facing the profession. Almost 100% of the respondents, 97% to be precise, indicate they are interested in hearing about new ways of managing LP activities.
Download the industry report
Nedap conducted the survey among 100 retail loss professionals in the USA in late August and early September 2020 with the goal to assist the profession in identifying and sharing data on new challenges, trends and solutions and the corresponding best practices. Our survey represents a good cross-section of the profession and subsectors within the industry and we hope it serves to provide benchmarks for all.
