ECR Retail Loss

Enabling the Retail Sector to Sell More and Lose Less

What To Make Of Unexpected News Stories In The Bagging Area?

If you were to read the press and social media, you could be forgiven for thinking that we have now reached the end of the growth of self-checkout in North America. In the US, Target is now limiting access to self-checkout lanes for shoppers buying 10 items or fewer. Dollar General is making three changes to its self-checkout strategy to get a grip on increasing retail losses.  Converting many self-service lanes to staff-assisted checkouts Limiting self-checkout transactions to five items or fewer Completely removing self-checkout from its 300 highest-shrink stores. Meanwhile, Canadian retailer Loblaw is introducing gated receipt scanners at the exit to self-checkout lanes. The aim is to further control losses. But behind these eye-catching headlines, we see no hard evidence that the pace of self-checkout adoption is declining.  What we hear most about is the expansion of self-checkouts, with the introduction of larger self-service payment areas designed for shopping carts/trollies, the use of hybrid SCO’s and momentum building on the Scan & Go proposition and several retailers in our SCO working group trialling smart carts. We also note, the growth of Self-Checkout deployments beyond just the supermarket, with deployments in fashion, drug, forecourt retail, club and cash & carry, home improvement, duty free shopping and discounters. ECR Retail Loss have been hosting regular online and in-person meetings on self-checkouts for over 15 years, with participation from the self-checkout experts from over 100 different retail business’s from around the world.  This group has commissioned and published multiple research papers on their impact on losses and the interventions that can reduce frustrations, improve scan accuracy, and decrease the # of walkaways.  Our latest report New design thinking for SCO | Ecr Shrink Group (ecrloss.com) offers innovative approaches from young designers to self-checkout stagnation.  It uses human-centred design techniques to tackle associated retail losses while creating an all-round better experience for staff and shoppers.  Based on the positive retailer responses, we can expect to see adaptations of these ideas in store soon!

Six Hot Meetings on OSA for your schedule!

In 2023, we launched our newest working group on OSA, with support from those leading the OSA work, the metrics, replenishment processes, online picking, new technology, etc, from over fifty different retailers, including Kroger, Walmart, Tesco, Asda, Jumbo, Deliveroo and others, as well as CPG's including Nestle, Procter & Gamble and Unilever The working group met five times, with online meetings on measurement, online subs, tech to measure OSA, managing OSA at peak and the role of CPG’s. Recordings of each meeting are available on request.  Today, we are happy to announce our next series of meetings. Following the same format, each meeting will start with a presentation or new research from the academics, or an update from retailers or CPG on their latest learnings, to then be followed by a group discussion. Each session will close with a recap on the key learning points. The meetings, topics and dates are below, please register yourself and your team to reserve a spot for those that fit with your work plan priorities and agenda. 1. IMPROVING SHELF REPLENISHMENT ROUTINES - WHAT WOULD TOYOTA DO? Date and time: Tuesday, April 23rd, 14:00 BST  Organisers: Paul Chapman, University of Oxford, Daniel Corsten, IE University, Madrid and Thomas Gruen, University of New Hampshire.   How can retailers increase the quality of the shelf (fewer out of stocks) while shortening lead time, removing "waste" and reducing cost? > Register Now <  2. OSA INNOVATION ONLINE SHOWCASE FINALE Date and time: Wednesday, May 22nd, 13:00 BST  Organisers: Jeremy Bassett, founder, CoCubed  The Top 10 global innovators in OSA will pitch their ideas to solve your on-shelf availability challenges. A must-see for all retailers.  > Register Now 3. SUBSTITUTIONS - HOW CAN DATA SCIENCE AND NEW TECHNOLOGIES REDUCE SURPRISES AND IMPROVE PRODUCTIVITY? Date and time: Tuesday, June 25th, 14:00 BST  Organisers: Paul Chapman, University of Oxford, Daniel Corsten, IE University, Madrid and Thomas Gruen, University of New Hampshire How can retailers find new ways to "save the sale" and reduce the cost of substitutes in online orders? > Register Now 4. EXPLORING THE IMPACT OF SELF CHECKOUTS ON IRI AND OSA [AND IMPLICATIONS] Date and time: Thursday, September 12th, 14:30 BST  Organisers: Paul Chapman, University of Oxford, Daniel Corsten, IE University, Madrid and Thomas Gruen, University of New Hampshire Scanning errors, wrong scans and walkaways will distort inventory records. Join retailers as they share their latest findings, data and evidence to confirm this relationship. > Register Now 5. AUTOMATING & AUGMENTING THE SHELF GAP SCANNING PROCESSES Date and time: Tuesday, November 19th, 14:30 GMT  Organisers: Paul Chapman, University of Oxford, Daniel Corsten, IE University, Madrid and Thomas Gruen, University of New Hampshire New technology and analytics have the potential to automate and augment the current gap-scanning processes. Learn more about the use of robots, drones, cameras and data science in retail.  > Register Now 6. HOW ARE CPGs HELPING RETAILERS IMPROVE OSA? Date and time: Thursday, January 23rd, 2025, 14:30 GMT  Organisers: Paul Chapman, University of Oxford, Daniel Corsten, IE University, Madrid and Thomas Gruen, University of New Hampshire  Updates from Unilever, Nestle and P&G on their work to support retailers with OSA measurement, resources, anomaly detection, anti-theft solutions and field-based resources, with a focus on best practices from South America > Register Now We look forward to seeing you online and finding new ways to solve on-shelf availability challenges.

Call for Judges: 2024 ECR Retail Risk, Security and Innovation Challenge

March 2024. We are excited to announce the launch of our 2024 Retail Risk, Safety & Security Innovation Challenge and need the help of retail security and risk experts to act as "shark tank / dragons dens" judges. This will involve helping us short-list a longlist of innovations and then joining us at our “shark tank” like online innovation showcase finale on October 23rd, where ten of the very hottest innovations will “pitch” their ideas. AT this meeting, the judges will be expected to ask and then rate each of the ten to reveal the most promising innovations. Being a judge gives you exclusive visibility to a longlist of 100+ innovations, that in theory are all with new ideas / ways of helping you deliver your work plan / business objectives. Getting hold of such a list would normally cost a business thousands but as a judge it will be zero cost. Further, what we have learnt from previous challenges, is that the judges gain immense value from the list, stimulating new ideas, and they all tell us that even though it can be a lot to get through, they thoroughly enjoy the rating process, especially if it’s a team effort with colleagues. And yes, we cannot promise judges that all the ideas on the list will be relevant, new, or different but typically find that there will a good few that will inspire and make you go "Wow!" If you would like to be a judge, the next step would be a short interview to understand from you what’s missing and where your unmet needs might be. This meeting will be require just 30 minutes of your time. If you can commit to this short interview and be one of our judges, please email, colin@ecrloss.com

Facial Recognition: 3 Key Insights

Most retail loss prevention leaders are highly familiar with the "watch list" use case for facial recognition in retail. In previous working groups we have heard retailers such as Rite Aid, share how they implemented the technology, as well as academics, lawyers and law enforcement, each providing their perspectives on the use of this technology and the extent that the technology can be compliant with government privacy regulations, such as GDPR. In our annual update, in January 2024, we heard updates from retailers, law enforcement and academia. Below are three key insights and takeaways from this meeting. 1) Implementation in retail is growing: In the meeting, there were over ten retailers, mainly from the UK and USA, who had either deployed to all stores, a number of stores or were finalising their pilot programmes. They reported that the technology was 99% accurate, some noting that their vendors had invested in both machines and human super spotters to ensure that high level of accuracy. That the alerts were made available to a member of staff within 7-10 seconds of the entry into the store of a bad actor on the watch list. These alerts, sent to a mobile device, required trained members of staff to either ask the bad actor to leave the store and / or to smother them in positive customer service. Through the use of this technology, retailers reported a very positive trend in [reduced number of] incidents and shrink, as repeat and prolific offenders are dissuaded from visiting and stealing from stores equipped with facial recognition technology. For one retailer, it has been the single most effective intervention they have ever introduced. To be compliant, stores are required to "advertise" the presence of this technology. To date, and in this meeting, none of the retailers reported any significant levels of complaints from the public on the use of this technology nor any evidence of a reduction in sales. Based on the discussion in the meeting, we expect to see more retailers, especially in USA and UK adopting this technology. However, we are also mindful that retailer momentum on this technology can quickly be curtailed by effective lobbying by privacy groups, as was the case in Australia (click to read the story) Finally, it was made very clear in our discussions that the likelihood of the adoption of this technology in Europe would be very low due to very strong privacy rules. 2) The outsourcing of the Data Controller / the "Watch List" Data Base is a key enabler For some of the retailers deploying face recognition, their technology vendor had also become their Data Controller, responsible for who [the bad actor] gets put into the data base, how long they remain on the data base, and the number of stores that will receive notifications when the bad actor enters their store, tiered based on risk level. The process for data collection and handling was described as follows. First, an incident in a store happens and is observed, this could be the theft of a bottle of wine, a thief grabbing a whole shelf of designer jeans or a member of staff assaulted. Second, a member of staff, or in some cases, the Security Guard, would document that incident via a digital form, look up and then attach the image of the offender captured on the high res facial recognition camera at the entrance of the store. They would then confirm that this statement was a true version of the incident, and then put their signature to the incident. They would then submit the incident into the system and in turn, the vendor, aka, the data controller Third, the data controller at the third party would then review the quality of the incident report form, does it describe in an appropriate way what happened and the offence caused. If it needs to be improved, they would contact the store and edit before submitting as an incident in the system. Fourth, the data controller would then decide proportionality, and set the system up to alert at just that store, stores within 5km, stores within 25km, every store, etc, based on the seriousness of the incident. Finally, the Data Controller would monitor the response rates to alerts sent, and manage the data / images to ensure that the data base remains compliant, for example, managing retention limits. There was discussion on how data bases could be populated with data from multiple retailers but there was some nervousness with this approach. Something for the future perhaps. 3) Acceptance of the technology is growing but it is not evenly spread. For air travellers and retail associates working in distribution centres, facial recognition technology has been a huge help to their lives. Click here to read story on the use of facial recognition in airports. The same level of positive acceptance cannot be said about the use of facial recognition in retail stores. In some countries, including most of Europe, the use of the technology is now banned, with seemingly no lobbies from retailers or law enforcement to adopt. In North America and Australia, the use of the technology is in the balance, the recent Rite Aid case and their "ban" on using the technology has probably slowed down the adoption and increased the nervousness of top retail leaders who were considering its use. Click here for the Rite Aid news story. Meanwhile in the UK, there is a stronger appetite for facial recognition from law enforcement and government in support of trials and adoption, despite a strong "anti-big brother" lobby. However, the ongoing concerns around privacy are likely to slow down the deployment of this technology in retail, especially for the larger UK retailers. The working group will revisit the use of the technology and updated results from those retailers who have deployed store wide on Jan 15th 2025. To register, click on the below invitation. In the meantime, and for some additional context, please click to view the quick video recap of the key findings from the meeting with Professor Beck.

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FOCUS AREAS

The research priorities are determined by its members – they drive the agenda to ensure ECR delivers research that meets the need of the industry bringing new insights, tools and techniques that enables retailers to sell more and lose less.