The holiday season is approaching . Along with the jolly spirit, festivities, and holiday shopping come new security issues. Hiring extra personnel for the stores this time of year is only one of the many extra security issues retail shop owners and managers have to deal with this holiday season. Now, shoplifting flash mobs are making an appearance in retail stores across the country, making the damage so much more than the lone shoplifter. Can the extra security personnel help? Follow the links below for more information about this and other stories.
Flash mobs the latest threat this holiday season
The holiday season rings in more than just higher sales for retailers. There’s also more shoplifting and lower profit margins than the rest of the year, according to a report released today. Plus, this year, there’s an extra surprise — flash mobs.
Not the dancing, music-playing, watching-a-couple-get-engaged kind of flash mobs. But the kind of flash mobs where a bunch of people all show up at a store at once, pull hats low over their heads, grab everything in sight, and split.
Just last week, there was a flash mob at an Apple store in Natick, Mass., that took off with more than $13,000 worth of iPhones in less than a minute.
Another flash mob last month near Boston netted more than $14,000.
Extra holiday patrols to keep EMC shoppers safe
The Safe Shopper Program, an initiative to reduce crime in East Montgomery County during the holiday months, will run this year from Oct. 15 to Jan. 31, 2017.
With the holiday season approaching, people in East Montgomery County may begin noticing extra patrols from the Montgomery County Precinct 4 Constable’s Office in EMC shopping centers.
The East Montgomery County Improvement District launched the Safe Shopper Program with MCCO Precinct 4 in 2012 as a way to diminish crime related to holiday shopping.
“It’s been a hugely successful program,” Kelley Mattlage, EMCID director of communications, said. “It’s basically a shoplifting safety program. EMCID pays the Constable’s Office overtime for extra patrols around the holidays. They go out to shopping centers and perform building checks, patrol parking lots and make sure no one is shoplifting or burglarizing vehicles.”
This year’s Safe Shopper Program begins Oct. 15 and will continue through Jan. 31, 2017; approximately two weeks longer than the program ran last year.
Recent thefts raise eyebrows at Abilene hardware store
ABILENE, Texas – Recent thefts at an Abilene hardware store are raising a few eyebrows.
A woman, with a baby carrier, is caught on surveillance video entering the store with a man and two children.
What happened next is surprising.
“Here they come, a man and his wife, her carrying the baby and they have their two little kids with them,” said Jennie Bright, general manager of Bible Hardware, while reviewing security footage.
“They kind of look around and come straight back down the aisle. There’s no employee right there and so she points to it, pulls the blanket back, puts it in there, covers that baby back up and walks out the door. The two kids are following and watching what the parents are doing.”
Bible Hardware in Abilene knows the cost of shoplifting is more than just the price of the item taken.
Bright said the store tried to keep the prices down to help customers out, but some people are helping themselves to what the store has.
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