All Crimewaves Are Bullshit
October 28, 2023 9:09 AM Subscribe
Target and other chains have overblown the impact of shoplifting. The rash of store closures across the nation are, as might have been suspected, driven by other factors - in the case of Rite Aid bankruptcy to avoid opiate lawsuits.
The malarkey is that employers shoplift dollars out of their employees' back-pockets via wage theft and somehow that is a problem for civil courts.
Abating the shoplifting would best first be addressed by showing employees that thieving is thieving, and it is either criminal or it ain't. Make shoplifting a civil matter or criminalize wage theft. That is the pair here to draw your attention to in my opinion.
posted by MonsieurPEB at 9:44 AM on October 28, 2023 [54 favorites]
Abating the shoplifting would best first be addressed by showing employees that thieving is thieving, and it is either criminal or it ain't. Make shoplifting a civil matter or criminalize wage theft. That is the pair here to draw your attention to in my opinion.
posted by MonsieurPEB at 9:44 AM on October 28, 2023 [54 favorites]
Sorry for being naïve (I expect there's an obvious answer) but how is rite-aid complicit? Don't they require a prescription to give out these drugs?
posted by rouftop at 9:56 AM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by rouftop at 9:56 AM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
Why Walgreens is in Trouble in San Francisco and is Closing Some Stores: It’s Not Shoplifting, that’s an Artful Distraction from the Real Reasons
-Wolfstreet 10/23/2021
posted by mmrtnt at 9:56 AM on October 28, 2023 [10 favorites]
-Wolfstreet 10/23/2021
posted by mmrtnt at 9:56 AM on October 28, 2023 [10 favorites]
I'm not sure how these stores in major cities still exist in the first place. I've heard it on good authority that Antifa and BLM burned all blue-state cities to the ground over the last couple of years, with complete impunity.
posted by delfin at 10:14 AM on October 28, 2023 [77 favorites]
posted by delfin at 10:14 AM on October 28, 2023 [77 favorites]
Sorry for being naïve (I expect there's an obvious answer) but how is rite-aid complicit? Don't they require a prescription to give out these drugs?
Pharmacists are also medical professionals who have to obtain graduate degrees, and are generally expected to be aware of what drugs they are dispensing. This is mostly around problems like drug interactions (I had a pharmacist catch one of these issues personally!), but I think they’re also supposed to flag warning signs of things like doctors with weird prescribing habits.
posted by learning from frequent failure at 10:23 AM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
Pharmacists are also medical professionals who have to obtain graduate degrees, and are generally expected to be aware of what drugs they are dispensing. This is mostly around problems like drug interactions (I had a pharmacist catch one of these issues personally!), but I think they’re also supposed to flag warning signs of things like doctors with weird prescribing habits.
posted by learning from frequent failure at 10:23 AM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
You can read the US DoJ complaint against Ride-Aid if you have questions about that.
posted by hippybear at 10:33 AM on October 28, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 10:33 AM on October 28, 2023 [10 favorites]
Sorry for being naïve (I expect there's an obvious answer) but how is rite-aid complicit? Don't they require a prescription to give out these drugs?
Yeah there's been a ton of analysis of the despicable role pharmacies played in the opioid crisis. Rite-Aid ignored obvious red flags while filling improper prescriptions, including invalid DEA registration numbers from medical practitioners they didn't bother to check, and lots of other glaring failures of oversight as they raked in that sweet sweet opioid cash for years.
posted by mediareport at 10:47 AM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
Yeah there's been a ton of analysis of the despicable role pharmacies played in the opioid crisis. Rite-Aid ignored obvious red flags while filling improper prescriptions, including invalid DEA registration numbers from medical practitioners they didn't bother to check, and lots of other glaring failures of oversight as they raked in that sweet sweet opioid cash for years.
posted by mediareport at 10:47 AM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
If Target is struggling, it’s not from stealing. It’s from refusing to remain half as good as they were 10 years ago. I used to shop there a lot, but these days every time I go into the store it feels like a compromise. They’ve gutted most of their stock offerings, so the items on display are in many cases their store brand or nothing in any given category. They can’t keep anything they do carry in stock, every time I go there I see large sections of empty shelves. My wife kept saying it was supply chain issues but I pointed out to her that Target is the only chain in our area that has these issues - so it may be supply chain, but it is entirely on their end, not on the suppliers. My son joked that shopping at Target is an exercise in “remember that product you liked last week? We don’t have it any more”. On top of everything else, it’s fall in Minnesota, and I have never once seen a Minnesota-grown apple in stock at this Minnesota-based retail chain. It’s downright embarrassing.
Basically they went from being a middle of the road option to trying to out-Walmart Walmart. That’s a losing game.
posted by caution live frogs at 11:17 AM on October 28, 2023 [51 favorites]
Basically they went from being a middle of the road option to trying to out-Walmart Walmart. That’s a losing game.
posted by caution live frogs at 11:17 AM on October 28, 2023 [51 favorites]
Yes, here in Seattle, (Ballard), there have been a lot of closures. Rite-Aid bought Bartell Drugs a year or so ago, and opened a bunch of stores in mixed-use retail/residential buildings. In pretty prime locations. One has closed, and another will likely close.
Across the street, the Sunset Bowl was torn down for a giant building, and the Target that went in there is about to close, for these bullshit "reasons".
PCC, (a local co-op that used to be in a shack basically, over by Green Lake), was doing well, got a new CEO, and decided growth was the way to go. There are now a bunch of them about the area. And because of bad choices in locations, and the lockdowns, they got fucked. And they have been blaming it on the Hazard-pay and unions and, whatever. Even though a couple of their new locations have cost them millions in rent, making those stores a massive liability. But the problem is shoplifting? Please.
Shop local you all. It makes our places better.
posted by Windopaene at 12:11 PM on October 28, 2023 [20 favorites]
Across the street, the Sunset Bowl was torn down for a giant building, and the Target that went in there is about to close, for these bullshit "reasons".
PCC, (a local co-op that used to be in a shack basically, over by Green Lake), was doing well, got a new CEO, and decided growth was the way to go. There are now a bunch of them about the area. And because of bad choices in locations, and the lockdowns, they got fucked. And they have been blaming it on the Hazard-pay and unions and, whatever. Even though a couple of their new locations have cost them millions in rent, making those stores a massive liability. But the problem is shoplifting? Please.
Shop local you all. It makes our places better.
posted by Windopaene at 12:11 PM on October 28, 2023 [20 favorites]
I feel people may be talking past one another a bit? Is the claim that there is a broad national 'crisis' around shoplifting? Or is it that, in certain locations (like downtown SF), shoplifting is locally sharply elevated - causing chain stores to abandon those areas?
posted by kickingtheground at 12:39 PM on October 28, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by kickingtheground at 12:39 PM on October 28, 2023 [5 favorites]
Is the claim that there is a broad national 'crisis' around shoplifting? Or is it that, in certain locations (like downtown SF), shoplifting is locally sharply elevated - causing chain stores to abandon those areas?
Yes, and yes. Both of those are claims being made, neither of them seem to be very credible when you look at the hard data.
posted by hippybear at 12:41 PM on October 28, 2023 [21 favorites]
Yes, and yes. Both of those are claims being made, neither of them seem to be very credible when you look at the hard data.
posted by hippybear at 12:41 PM on October 28, 2023 [21 favorites]
Why Walgreens is in Trouble in San Francisco and is Closing Some Stores: It’s Not Shoplifting, that’s an Artful Distraction from the Real Reasons
Yeah, in 2005 when there were four Walgreens in a 2 block radius anywhere near downtown, it was completely obvious that wasn't at all sustainable and as soon as they'd managed to force all the other drugstores out of town that they were planning to shut down at least half of those stores. When I say "not sustainable" I mean without even assuming that San Francisco's downtown would turn into a retail wasteland as everyone went remote due to an as-of-yet unforeseen pandemic.
posted by aubilenon at 12:42 PM on October 28, 2023 [18 favorites]
Yeah, in 2005 when there were four Walgreens in a 2 block radius anywhere near downtown, it was completely obvious that wasn't at all sustainable and as soon as they'd managed to force all the other drugstores out of town that they were planning to shut down at least half of those stores. When I say "not sustainable" I mean without even assuming that San Francisco's downtown would turn into a retail wasteland as everyone went remote due to an as-of-yet unforeseen pandemic.
posted by aubilenon at 12:42 PM on October 28, 2023 [18 favorites]
Or is it that, in certain locations (like downtown SF), shoplifting is locally sharply elevated - causing chain stores to abandon those areas?
As the podcast linked above points out, this claim is objectively false. Shoplifting is not sharply elevated, even in places like San Francisco. Target and Walgreens wanted to close those locations for other reasons and are blaming it on shoplifting to avoid bad publicity and shareholder blowback. They cite an 80% rise in the level of shoplifting year over year.
80%! Year over year! That's horrendous and shocking! How could that be!?
Wait, how could that be? That's insane! You wouldn't. . . you wouldn't be comparing figures from the pandemic, when all your stores were closed, to the same period in the first year post-pandemic, when hey all reopened would you? That would be shockingly dishonest.
Yes. That's what they are doing. If you look at levels from before COVID, there has been no material change -- even in SF. Shoplifting, like all property crime, is either steady or slightly down. In some SF neighborhoods it is very slightly higher, but not materially so. What you are seeing is the presence of "smash and grab" videos on social media. No new crime; just a moral panic and retailers using it for profit.
posted by The Bellman at 12:46 PM on October 28, 2023 [102 favorites]
As the podcast linked above points out, this claim is objectively false. Shoplifting is not sharply elevated, even in places like San Francisco. Target and Walgreens wanted to close those locations for other reasons and are blaming it on shoplifting to avoid bad publicity and shareholder blowback. They cite an 80% rise in the level of shoplifting year over year.
80%! Year over year! That's horrendous and shocking! How could that be!?
Wait, how could that be? That's insane! You wouldn't. . . you wouldn't be comparing figures from the pandemic, when all your stores were closed, to the same period in the first year post-pandemic, when hey all reopened would you? That would be shockingly dishonest.
Yes. That's what they are doing. If you look at levels from before COVID, there has been no material change -- even in SF. Shoplifting, like all property crime, is either steady or slightly down. In some SF neighborhoods it is very slightly higher, but not materially so. What you are seeing is the presence of "smash and grab" videos on social media. No new crime; just a moral panic and retailers using it for profit.
posted by The Bellman at 12:46 PM on October 28, 2023 [102 favorites]
I’ve been wondering how much the new laws for online sales are affecting things, too. Our local news was a lot quicker to talk about how groups were stealing stuff rather than how Facebook, Amazon, and eBay were making a lot of money fencing it.
posted by adamsc at 12:57 PM on October 28, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by adamsc at 12:57 PM on October 28, 2023 [6 favorites]
The problem with this debunking is that retail chains are taking radical steps in the stores they are keeping open to reduce theft that are extremely costly at the level of both reduced sales and higher units of labor per aisle. If the concern about theft were just a pretext they would not be doing this.
The article is also making a huge (deliberate?) statistical error in speaking about the increase in shrink as being "only" 0.4%. That's 0.4% not of the prior levels of shrink, but of the entire amount of revenues. For operations such as retailers with low margins, 0.4% of sales is a huge reduction in profit. CVS's profit margin for the last 12 months is 2.9%. That many of the stores worst hit by theft are also in neighborhoods with office occupancy that has not recovered pre-COVID levels, significant increase in street homelessness, and high wage and benefit mandates only makes it worse.
posted by MattD at 1:06 PM on October 28, 2023 [17 favorites]
The article is also making a huge (deliberate?) statistical error in speaking about the increase in shrink as being "only" 0.4%. That's 0.4% not of the prior levels of shrink, but of the entire amount of revenues. For operations such as retailers with low margins, 0.4% of sales is a huge reduction in profit. CVS's profit margin for the last 12 months is 2.9%. That many of the stores worst hit by theft are also in neighborhoods with office occupancy that has not recovered pre-COVID levels, significant increase in street homelessness, and high wage and benefit mandates only makes it worse.
posted by MattD at 1:06 PM on October 28, 2023 [17 favorites]
The local grocery store (run by Kroger) has taken to putting armed guards at the doors to look at your receipt before you leave. It's total security theater, they don't even look at what they're circling on the paper and it's different every time. I hate it so much.
Any time I see a store is closing because of "theft" I suspect the real answer is either real estate prices or the workforce is making noises about unionizing. Happened with a lot of Starbucks locations and the REI downtown. Given that half the country thinks all big cities are antifa-run wastelands, it's an easy thing to blame on generic crime regardless of reality.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 1:20 PM on October 28, 2023 [18 favorites]
Any time I see a store is closing because of "theft" I suspect the real answer is either real estate prices or the workforce is making noises about unionizing. Happened with a lot of Starbucks locations and the REI downtown. Given that half the country thinks all big cities are antifa-run wastelands, it's an easy thing to blame on generic crime regardless of reality.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 1:20 PM on October 28, 2023 [18 favorites]
With a Starbucks there’s a fair chance the “crime” is “staff dared to unionize”.
posted by Artw at 1:27 PM on October 28, 2023 [32 favorites]
posted by Artw at 1:27 PM on October 28, 2023 [32 favorites]
Is the claim that there is a broad national 'crisis' around shoplifting? Or is it that, in certain locations (like downtown SF), shoplifting is locally sharply elevated - causing chain stores to abandon those areas?
Some of each.
Part of it is the "become the media" effect, naturally. Every time someone gets a video clip of a person walking out of a store with stolen goods, it's halfway around the conservative social media world before actual statistics get their boots on. Every time there's an incident where a group of young people swarm a store, mental multipliers kick in and people loudly assume that it's happening a hundred more times in a hundred more stores every week and just not getting caught on camera. Every time a person gets fired for violating their own store's policy on casual theft and physically confronting the thief, they're a cause celebre in those circles for a week or two for DEFENDING SOCIETY FROM HORRIBLE SAVAGE INVADERS.
Shoplifting and theft happen. Always will. People want and need things. But it's hard to convince some people that there isn't a national or regional crime epidemic indicating the utter downfall of human society and dignity (though only in THOSE areas, try that in a small town) if much of their entire worldview depends on that being true.
posted by delfin at 1:43 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
Some of each.
Part of it is the "become the media" effect, naturally. Every time someone gets a video clip of a person walking out of a store with stolen goods, it's halfway around the conservative social media world before actual statistics get their boots on. Every time there's an incident where a group of young people swarm a store, mental multipliers kick in and people loudly assume that it's happening a hundred more times in a hundred more stores every week and just not getting caught on camera. Every time a person gets fired for violating their own store's policy on casual theft and physically confronting the thief, they're a cause celebre in those circles for a week or two for DEFENDING SOCIETY FROM HORRIBLE SAVAGE INVADERS.
Shoplifting and theft happen. Always will. People want and need things. But it's hard to convince some people that there isn't a national or regional crime epidemic indicating the utter downfall of human society and dignity (though only in THOSE areas, try that in a small town) if much of their entire worldview depends on that being true.
posted by delfin at 1:43 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
If Target is struggling, it’s not from stealing. It’s from refusing to remain half as good as they were 10 years ago. I used to shop there a lot, but these days every time I go into the store it feels like a compromise.
I was at a Target today to pick up a gift for a kid's birthday party. Hoo what an "experience." Hard to navigate signage, no workers in sight, found the toy area and shelves were a mess, and the self-checkout had a 10+ minute line and it was hard to tell which machines were working and which weren't. They couldn't even afford a single employee to direct people to the machines that were functioning. We would have used regular checkout, but they had ONE REGISTER OPEN to serve a Target store in one of the most urbanly dense and expensive cities in the US (that line had to be at least a 30-minute wait).
Shoplifting isn't the problem.
posted by ryoshu at 1:45 PM on October 28, 2023 [38 favorites]
I was at a Target today to pick up a gift for a kid's birthday party. Hoo what an "experience." Hard to navigate signage, no workers in sight, found the toy area and shelves were a mess, and the self-checkout had a 10+ minute line and it was hard to tell which machines were working and which weren't. They couldn't even afford a single employee to direct people to the machines that were functioning. We would have used regular checkout, but they had ONE REGISTER OPEN to serve a Target store in one of the most urbanly dense and expensive cities in the US (that line had to be at least a 30-minute wait).
Shoplifting isn't the problem.
posted by ryoshu at 1:45 PM on October 28, 2023 [38 favorites]
The problem with this debunking is that retail chains are taking radical steps in the stores they are keeping open to reduce theft that are extremely costly at the level of both reduced sales and higher units of labor per aisle. If the concern about theft were just a pretext they would not be doing this.
You're making a lot of assumptions here; I don't think chains have added staff just to unlock razors, for instance; they've just made it more unpleasant to wait around for someone. And once you're standing in the razor aisle with half a basket of shopping waiting for someone to unlock a razor because you need one, you're extremely unlikely to leave and go to another store (where the razor is probably equally locked up).
The article is also making a huge (deliberate?) statistical error in speaking about the increase in shrink as being "only" 0.4%. That's 0.4% not of the prior levels of shrink, but of the entire amount of revenues. For operations such as retailers with low margins, 0.4% of sales is a huge reduction in profit. CVS's profit margin for the last 12 months is 2.9%. That many of the stores worst hit by theft are also in neighborhoods with office occupancy that has not recovered pre-COVID levels, significant increase in street homelessness, and high wage and benefit mandates only makes it worse.
A big thing that retailers have done is go from fully staffed checkouts to largely automated checkouts with a little oversight, and as they did it, they knew full well that having a bunch of random people checking out their purchases would result in more 'shrink' than if checking out was being done by people who were trained and paid by the store. But they accepted that this was worth it because they could fire a bunch of workers and reduce their staffing cost substantially.
And now they're coming back and pointing to the rise in 'shrink', from the policies they implemented as if it wasn't a choice that they made, and they're creating this mass lobbying/propaganda campaign to increase the use of the public police to act as private security. They want to have everybody's cake, and make us pay them for the privilege of them eating it too.
posted by Superilla at 2:16 PM on October 28, 2023 [85 favorites]
You're making a lot of assumptions here; I don't think chains have added staff just to unlock razors, for instance; they've just made it more unpleasant to wait around for someone. And once you're standing in the razor aisle with half a basket of shopping waiting for someone to unlock a razor because you need one, you're extremely unlikely to leave and go to another store (where the razor is probably equally locked up).
The article is also making a huge (deliberate?) statistical error in speaking about the increase in shrink as being "only" 0.4%. That's 0.4% not of the prior levels of shrink, but of the entire amount of revenues. For operations such as retailers with low margins, 0.4% of sales is a huge reduction in profit. CVS's profit margin for the last 12 months is 2.9%. That many of the stores worst hit by theft are also in neighborhoods with office occupancy that has not recovered pre-COVID levels, significant increase in street homelessness, and high wage and benefit mandates only makes it worse.
A big thing that retailers have done is go from fully staffed checkouts to largely automated checkouts with a little oversight, and as they did it, they knew full well that having a bunch of random people checking out their purchases would result in more 'shrink' than if checking out was being done by people who were trained and paid by the store. But they accepted that this was worth it because they could fire a bunch of workers and reduce their staffing cost substantially.
And now they're coming back and pointing to the rise in 'shrink', from the policies they implemented as if it wasn't a choice that they made, and they're creating this mass lobbying/propaganda campaign to increase the use of the public police to act as private security. They want to have everybody's cake, and make us pay them for the privilege of them eating it too.
posted by Superilla at 2:16 PM on October 28, 2023 [85 favorites]
I'd also be curious how much self checkout is contributing to shrink. Just a few days ago, I got some reasonably pricey windshield wiper blades for nothing at Walmart because I forgot they were under the dog kibble at self checkout. I realized when I got out to the car, and debated doing the right thing by standing in the always long return/customer service line, staffed by some amusingly indifferent employees, or just leave.
I left.
Even though it was an honest mistake,and I'm not losing sleep over it, I do feel kind of bad.
posted by 2N2222 at 2:28 PM on October 28, 2023 [16 favorites]
I left.
Even though it was an honest mistake,and I'm not losing sleep over it, I do feel kind of bad.
posted by 2N2222 at 2:28 PM on October 28, 2023 [16 favorites]
Wage theft results in greater loss than any other form of theft, and than all other forms of theft combined. In fact it results in about three times more lost dollars than all other forms of theft combined.
Therefore any megacorp whining about shoplifting gets the world's tiniest violin, and I'm glad to see some extra facts helping back that up.
posted by sotonohito at 2:48 PM on October 28, 2023 [58 favorites]
Therefore any megacorp whining about shoplifting gets the world's tiniest violin, and I'm glad to see some extra facts helping back that up.
posted by sotonohito at 2:48 PM on October 28, 2023 [58 favorites]
I feel bad when I forget that I have not gotten "No Bags" and I am costing the folks 8 cents, (we have laws here about the real cost of grocery bags), but at that point, I too tend to be, "fuck it".
posted by Windopaene at 2:49 PM on October 28, 2023
posted by Windopaene at 2:49 PM on October 28, 2023
I feel bad when I forget that I have not gotten "No Bags" and I am costing the folks 8 cents, (we have laws here about the real cost of grocery bags), but at that point, I too tend to be, "fuck it".
Are those laws about the real cost of grocery bags, or are they laws designed to encourage repeat use of bags, discourage single-use bags, and are imposing a negligible but annoying cost in order to help drive this social change?
A grocery bag doesn't cost eight cents. If they did, they would never have given them away willy-nilly for so many decades.
posted by hippybear at 2:52 PM on October 28, 2023 [3 favorites]
Are those laws about the real cost of grocery bags, or are they laws designed to encourage repeat use of bags, discourage single-use bags, and are imposing a negligible but annoying cost in order to help drive this social change?
A grocery bag doesn't cost eight cents. If they did, they would never have given them away willy-nilly for so many decades.
posted by hippybear at 2:52 PM on October 28, 2023 [3 favorites]
It is certainly the former.
Though I think single use plastic bags aren't allowed in Seattle? Maybe at the drugstores but not at the grocery stores. Some deals were made I would guess. Whatever it was, we voted for it, and it is fine with me.
posted by Windopaene at 3:29 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
Though I think single use plastic bags aren't allowed in Seattle? Maybe at the drugstores but not at the grocery stores. Some deals were made I would guess. Whatever it was, we voted for it, and it is fine with me.
posted by Windopaene at 3:29 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
The problem with this debunking is that retail chains are taking radical steps in the stores they are keeping open to reduce theft that are extremely costly at the level of both reduced sales and higher units of labor per aisle. If the concern about theft were just a pretext they would not be doing this.
Or they're doing this because when you walk into a Walgreen's there are like only two employees now.
posted by oneirodynia at 3:30 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
Or they're doing this because when you walk into a Walgreen's there are like only two employees now.
posted by oneirodynia at 3:30 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
But...
Pay someone to fill the jobs your business needs to function?
posted by Windopaene at 3:33 PM on October 28, 2023 [11 favorites]
Pay someone to fill the jobs your business needs to function?
posted by Windopaene at 3:33 PM on October 28, 2023 [11 favorites]
The Ballard Target that closed, as far as I could tell each time I went past it was completely empty of customers AND staff.
posted by Artw at 3:34 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Artw at 3:34 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
as far as I could tell each time I went past it was completely empty of customers AND staff
Hard to know, really, without going inside.
I was in Seattle recently and went to a Walgreens in Capital Hill that had three employees working there, one guard at the door, one manager repricing items in an aisle, and one person at a checkout stand. Granted, it was a postage-stamp size store, but it felt really really understaffed to me.
posted by hippybear at 3:36 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
Hard to know, really, without going inside.
I was in Seattle recently and went to a Walgreens in Capital Hill that had three employees working there, one guard at the door, one manager repricing items in an aisle, and one person at a checkout stand. Granted, it was a postage-stamp size store, but it felt really really understaffed to me.
posted by hippybear at 3:36 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
Hard to know, really, without going inside.
Designwise it’s a big glass box. There may be blindspots where staff were hiding out, but the overall impression was that it was deserted.
posted by Artw at 3:47 PM on October 28, 2023
Designwise it’s a big glass box. There may be blindspots where staff were hiding out, but the overall impression was that it was deserted.
posted by Artw at 3:47 PM on October 28, 2023
Our local fake news site, regarding the Ballard Target: Cramped, Overpriced Corporate Store with No Parking or Anything On Your Shopping List Shutting Down Due to Safety Concerns.
(This store was apparently part of a experiment of sorts to build smaller Target stores in urban neighborhoods. But that meant less selection than in their existing big-box stores.)
posted by mbrubeck at 4:05 PM on October 28, 2023 [14 favorites]
(This store was apparently part of a experiment of sorts to build smaller Target stores in urban neighborhoods. But that meant less selection than in their existing big-box stores.)
posted by mbrubeck at 4:05 PM on October 28, 2023 [14 favorites]
Well well well, if it isn’t the consequences of running monopolistic big box stores that are trashing the economy.
posted by The River Ivel at 4:10 PM on October 28, 2023 [16 favorites]
posted by The River Ivel at 4:10 PM on October 28, 2023 [16 favorites]
I'm not sure that it's necessarily so much about trashing the economy in this instance, as much as it is that they've figured out a way to socially engineer displacing the costs of security that come along with operating stores from the corporate coffers to the public coffers, transferring perceived responsibility of store security from being the duty of the owners of the store to being that of police departments.
posted by hippybear at 4:16 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 4:16 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
If you see someone shoplifting, mind your own fucking business. Let Batman handle it. Consequences for such a small thing can be stupidly overboard - maybe even prison. Let it go.
posted by adept256 at 4:18 PM on October 28, 2023 [30 favorites]
posted by adept256 at 4:18 PM on October 28, 2023 [30 favorites]
A very common graffiti around the world in numerous languages is "If you saw someone shoplifting food, no you didn't."
posted by hippybear at 4:21 PM on October 28, 2023 [33 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 4:21 PM on October 28, 2023 [33 favorites]
Though I think single use plastic bags aren't allowed in Seattle?
Yeah here in Pierce county, you can only get slightly heavier plastic bags "for re-use" that nobody uses again and just throws away same as the old thin plastic bags. I'm not sure that was a win.
(I do like the true re-usable bags with handles and use them often, but the outlawing disposable plastic bags thing didn't work at all)
posted by ctmf at 4:24 PM on October 28, 2023
Yeah here in Pierce county, you can only get slightly heavier plastic bags "for re-use" that nobody uses again and just throws away same as the old thin plastic bags. I'm not sure that was a win.
(I do like the true re-usable bags with handles and use them often, but the outlawing disposable plastic bags thing didn't work at all)
posted by ctmf at 4:24 PM on October 28, 2023
e making a lot of assumptions here; I don't think chains have added staff just to unlock razors, for instance; they've just made it more unpleasant to wait around for someone. And once you're standing in the razor aisle with half a basket of shopping waiting for someone to unlock a razor because you need one, you're extremely unlikely to leave and go to another store (where the razor is probably equally locked up).
I find it easier and faster to order lady razors off Amazon than I do to buy it in the nearest Wal-Mart, where the razors and pretty much all personal item stuff seem to be locked up, they tell you to push a button for help, nobody comes, if you find an employee they can't or won't do it, for whatever reason. I've found at least one Safeway that isn't locking up the razors, so there's that, at least, but for fuck's sake.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:29 PM on October 28, 2023 [6 favorites]
I find it easier and faster to order lady razors off Amazon than I do to buy it in the nearest Wal-Mart, where the razors and pretty much all personal item stuff seem to be locked up, they tell you to push a button for help, nobody comes, if you find an employee they can't or won't do it, for whatever reason. I've found at least one Safeway that isn't locking up the razors, so there's that, at least, but for fuck's sake.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:29 PM on October 28, 2023 [6 favorites]
I was just at Safeway, and yes, they have plastic bags.
The Ballard Target was small. It does have a parking garage underneath, But there was never a ton of people there. But to say it was "safety concerns" rather than, how much this rent costs for this amount of business is ludicrous.
posted by Windopaene at 4:56 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
The Ballard Target was small. It does have a parking garage underneath, But there was never a ton of people there. But to say it was "safety concerns" rather than, how much this rent costs for this amount of business is ludicrous.
posted by Windopaene at 4:56 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
And once you're standing in the razor aisle with half a basket of shopping waiting for someone to unlock a razor because you need one, you're extremely unlikely to leave and go to another store (where the razor is probably equally locked up).
I don't think I'm an outlier in that I just leave if my local Target has locked something up, and they have gotten very enthusiastic about it. However, I don't think they're taking much, if any hit, as MattD suggested. It's vanishingly rare that I don't buy something because they've locked it up--like everyone else, I'm buying food, as Target is dramatically cheaper than most other places in the neighborhood. Maybe now that all the RiteAids have closed you might find yourself in a pickle needing to buy toothpaste. To be honest, I've basically assumed it's racial profiling--demographics are the thing that separates us from the other small urban Targets without parking.
posted by hoyland at 5:00 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
I don't think I'm an outlier in that I just leave if my local Target has locked something up, and they have gotten very enthusiastic about it. However, I don't think they're taking much, if any hit, as MattD suggested. It's vanishingly rare that I don't buy something because they've locked it up--like everyone else, I'm buying food, as Target is dramatically cheaper than most other places in the neighborhood. Maybe now that all the RiteAids have closed you might find yourself in a pickle needing to buy toothpaste. To be honest, I've basically assumed it's racial profiling--demographics are the thing that separates us from the other small urban Targets without parking.
posted by hoyland at 5:00 PM on October 28, 2023 [8 favorites]
A nearby police force recently announced a major crackdown on retail crime, particularly shoplifting, because [some ridiculous percentage — maybe 80%] leads to violence against retail employees. Er, that is not shoplifting, that is assault, and it’s already illegal.
As if for maximum grossness, their press release makes several mentions of baby food being targeted by shoplifters.
I am certain that some desperately poor 19-year-old who boosts two jars of Gerbers will definitely have the life of herself and her child improved by being thrown into the criminal justice system.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:37 PM on October 28, 2023 [11 favorites]
As if for maximum grossness, their press release makes several mentions of baby food being targeted by shoplifters.
I am certain that some desperately poor 19-year-old who boosts two jars of Gerbers will definitely have the life of herself and her child improved by being thrown into the criminal justice system.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:37 PM on October 28, 2023 [11 favorites]
I don't think I've ever been in a Target that had a grocery department. Mostly here in Washington but several in Kansas City and Atlanta areas. Maybe I just didn't browse enough.
But as was said, if you want razors, you are waiting for an employee to show up. Big places have a useless button. Smaller places you have to find a checker, but when you ask, seems more responsive.
But agreed with the security theater that is going on. Every grocery now has a security thing in the parking lot taking video, (good luck accessing that footage when someone backs into you), and most all have "private security: hanging out, often armed, often just looking at their phones.
The place I have in mind is a Fred Meyer. Big store. But, bathrooms don't have doors, so can't be num-locked. There is an encampment on the nearby corner. Pretty sure that bathroom is being utilized by the folks there. I got punched out in that bathroom a year and a half ago by some unwell person.
But the theater stuff isn't doing anything. Maybe it is. Maybe shrink is down .01%, PROFIT!!!
Capitalism...! I don't see it getting better soon. And I haven't even mentioned guns...
posted by Windopaene at 5:43 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
But as was said, if you want razors, you are waiting for an employee to show up. Big places have a useless button. Smaller places you have to find a checker, but when you ask, seems more responsive.
But agreed with the security theater that is going on. Every grocery now has a security thing in the parking lot taking video, (good luck accessing that footage when someone backs into you), and most all have "private security: hanging out, often armed, often just looking at their phones.
The place I have in mind is a Fred Meyer. Big store. But, bathrooms don't have doors, so can't be num-locked. There is an encampment on the nearby corner. Pretty sure that bathroom is being utilized by the folks there. I got punched out in that bathroom a year and a half ago by some unwell person.
But the theater stuff isn't doing anything. Maybe it is. Maybe shrink is down .01%, PROFIT!!!
Capitalism...! I don't see it getting better soon. And I haven't even mentioned guns...
posted by Windopaene at 5:43 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
slight derail but seems like an opportunity to insert a gentle reminder that buying groceries specifically at Target undermines union grocery workers in your area. Groceries are one of the last areas of the American private sector where you can choose union labor, if there are union grocery stores where you live.
(I believe Target is specifically an American retail experience but either way can't speak to union status in other countries.)
posted by kensington314 at 5:53 PM on October 28, 2023 [12 favorites]
(I believe Target is specifically an American retail experience but either way can't speak to union status in other countries.)
posted by kensington314 at 5:53 PM on October 28, 2023 [12 favorites]
The Target here in Brunswick, GA does have a grocery department. Our town is such that it qualifies as a relatively high class grocery, ahead of Walmart and Winn Dixie, about tied with Publix, and behind the Harris-Teeter on St Simons Island. It's selection is pretty limited though.
On whether locking things up has an impact on sales or not well, unquestionably, it does; what is at issue is if the intersection of actual profit difference and managerial inertia is enough to do something about it, with the answer being no, usually. For awhile social media was something of a solution, as you could publicly gripe about it there, and if enough other people noticed your stink to also gripe, it might shake their PR department enough to do something, maybe-possibly-slightly. But now even that pathetic avenue has decayed into suck, because an ultra rich baby man wanted to own it.
posted by JHarris at 6:01 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
On whether locking things up has an impact on sales or not well, unquestionably, it does; what is at issue is if the intersection of actual profit difference and managerial inertia is enough to do something about it, with the answer being no, usually. For awhile social media was something of a solution, as you could publicly gripe about it there, and if enough other people noticed your stink to also gripe, it might shake their PR department enough to do something, maybe-possibly-slightly. But now even that pathetic avenue has decayed into suck, because an ultra rich baby man wanted to own it.
posted by JHarris at 6:01 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
Wait, how could that be? That's insane! You wouldn't. . . you wouldn't be comparing figures from the pandemic, when all your stores were closed, to the same period in the first year post-pandemic, when hey all reopened would you? That would be shockingly dishonest.
Back when things were first reopening during the pandemic and we had that whole national discourse about there not being enough workers to fill all these jobs, I remember walking through Target around the holidays and hearing a group of their handful of overworked employees complaining to each other that they were barely being given any hours. Then there was all the jacking up of prices above and beyond what was justified by supply chain issues. These companies sure didn't miss a chance to use the pandemic to spin a story while making an extra buck.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:15 PM on October 28, 2023 [15 favorites]
Back when things were first reopening during the pandemic and we had that whole national discourse about there not being enough workers to fill all these jobs, I remember walking through Target around the holidays and hearing a group of their handful of overworked employees complaining to each other that they were barely being given any hours. Then there was all the jacking up of prices above and beyond what was justified by supply chain issues. These companies sure didn't miss a chance to use the pandemic to spin a story while making an extra buck.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:15 PM on October 28, 2023 [15 favorites]
“Inflation.”
posted by Artw at 6:17 PM on October 28, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by Artw at 6:17 PM on October 28, 2023 [6 favorites]
The chain drugstores really do seem to be struggling. I went to one twice recently, once for a covid booster and once for passport photos, and both times I saw staff visibly frustrated and slowed down by IT problems, including the photo computer crashing and needing literally 10 minutes to reboot.
The stores are usually understaffed and visibly dirty, to boot. But I started thinking about how much of what people used to buy there has fallen out of favor because of technology and it’s not a small list: photo film and processing, greeting cards, newspapers and magazines, paperback books, batteries and various small electronics, blank audio and video tapes, headphones, stationery items, street maps, incandescent bulbs…
You can see these ‘90s Walgreens photos: an aisle of greeting cards and magazines, an aisle of audio/video/electronics, a big photo section.
posted by smelendez at 6:17 PM on October 28, 2023 [10 favorites]
The stores are usually understaffed and visibly dirty, to boot. But I started thinking about how much of what people used to buy there has fallen out of favor because of technology and it’s not a small list: photo film and processing, greeting cards, newspapers and magazines, paperback books, batteries and various small electronics, blank audio and video tapes, headphones, stationery items, street maps, incandescent bulbs…
You can see these ‘90s Walgreens photos: an aisle of greeting cards and magazines, an aisle of audio/video/electronics, a big photo section.
posted by smelendez at 6:17 PM on October 28, 2023 [10 favorites]
Popular Information (quoted in the CNBC article) has also been covering this story for a while, most recently comparing crime data around Target stores in Manhattan and San Francisco.
This data reveals that stores that are being closed have lower levels of theft than nearby stores that have remained open. An analysis of the stores Target is shuttering in the Seattle area follows a similar pattern. This data suggests that factors other than crime are driving Target's decisions.posted by swift at 6:38 PM on October 28, 2023 [16 favorites]
Adding the steady drum beat of articles on these “phenomena” in major outlets to the list of reasons I now feel like attempting to keep up with the news is actually making me *dumber*.
posted by ryanshepard at 6:40 PM on October 28, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by ryanshepard at 6:40 PM on October 28, 2023 [3 favorites]
shrink != shoplifting
Lots of posts here seem to be using these terms interchangeable - they are not. But of course the chains themselves conflate the two.
I used to spend several thousand dollars a year at my local Walgreens on 35mm film & processing, up until 2017ish or so. I'd inevitably pick up other stuff while I was there. Now I only go in if I desperately need some personal grooming item that Amazon won't get to me in time, and they're inevitably so under staffed half the time I just leave without it because it's too much of a hassle.
posted by bradbane at 6:42 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
Lots of posts here seem to be using these terms interchangeable - they are not. But of course the chains themselves conflate the two.
I used to spend several thousand dollars a year at my local Walgreens on 35mm film & processing, up until 2017ish or so. I'd inevitably pick up other stuff while I was there. Now I only go in if I desperately need some personal grooming item that Amazon won't get to me in time, and they're inevitably so under staffed half the time I just leave without it because it's too much of a hassle.
posted by bradbane at 6:42 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]
The article is also making a huge (deliberate?) statistical error in speaking about the increase in shrink as being "only" 0.4%. That's 0.4% not of the prior levels of shrink, but of the entire amount of revenues. For operations such as retailers with low margins, 0.4% of sales is a huge reduction in profit.
You are doing the opposite right here.
2.6% profits is (total revenue)/(total costs) is 1.026. But losing 0.4% of your goods does *not* reduce this by 0.004 because 33% of your costs are real estate, 16% are labour, and only 50% are stocking and restocking (including paying suppliers), or similar.
This means that at worst your stocking and restocking costs go up by 0.4%, and probably less. It doesn't cost you any more on the real estate or back-office costs. You only get a 0.4% subtraction if you imagine that every stolen item magically converted into a sale, which is sort of ridiculous (the people stealing aren't going to buy it using the money they don't have if they suddenly stop stealing).
In addition, the margins of retailers are low because they find a way to spend 100$ to earn 101$ and repeatedly do it until risk makes them stop, as each time they do it they earn 1$. What more, they borrow 100$ at 5% interest, make 106$ over the year using that 100$, and pay 105$ back.
And if they have some cash cow that requires 100$ to make 200$ in revenue, they borrow 2000$ at 5% interest, return that 2000$ as profit to stakeholders, and have the 100$ in profit service that debt.
Walgreens has a 29 B cost of revenue producing 35.4 B revenue - its margin of revenue for expenses is 22%. Every dollar it spends on salaries, real estate, and goods produces 22 cents in profit. A 22% "profit" margin, not 2.6%.
It is bankrupt because it owes enough money that those 6.4 B per year in surplus revenue doesn't pay for the debt it has accumulated.
That is what modern capitalism does. If you have a revenue stream, you borrow against it, and use the capital to either grow or return money to stakeholders. Then when the revenue stream shrinks, you are "forced" to tighten your belt and pass costs down to workers and consumers. And if pensions happen to have the lowest call on your income stream and get liquidated during bankruptcy? Sucks to be a worker.
posted by NotAYakk at 7:05 PM on October 28, 2023 [40 favorites]
You are doing the opposite right here.
2.6% profits is (total revenue)/(total costs) is 1.026. But losing 0.4% of your goods does *not* reduce this by 0.004 because 33% of your costs are real estate, 16% are labour, and only 50% are stocking and restocking (including paying suppliers), or similar.
This means that at worst your stocking and restocking costs go up by 0.4%, and probably less. It doesn't cost you any more on the real estate or back-office costs. You only get a 0.4% subtraction if you imagine that every stolen item magically converted into a sale, which is sort of ridiculous (the people stealing aren't going to buy it using the money they don't have if they suddenly stop stealing).
In addition, the margins of retailers are low because they find a way to spend 100$ to earn 101$ and repeatedly do it until risk makes them stop, as each time they do it they earn 1$. What more, they borrow 100$ at 5% interest, make 106$ over the year using that 100$, and pay 105$ back.
And if they have some cash cow that requires 100$ to make 200$ in revenue, they borrow 2000$ at 5% interest, return that 2000$ as profit to stakeholders, and have the 100$ in profit service that debt.
Walgreens has a 29 B cost of revenue producing 35.4 B revenue - its margin of revenue for expenses is 22%. Every dollar it spends on salaries, real estate, and goods produces 22 cents in profit. A 22% "profit" margin, not 2.6%.
It is bankrupt because it owes enough money that those 6.4 B per year in surplus revenue doesn't pay for the debt it has accumulated.
That is what modern capitalism does. If you have a revenue stream, you borrow against it, and use the capital to either grow or return money to stakeholders. Then when the revenue stream shrinks, you are "forced" to tighten your belt and pass costs down to workers and consumers. And if pensions happen to have the lowest call on your income stream and get liquidated during bankruptcy? Sucks to be a worker.
posted by NotAYakk at 7:05 PM on October 28, 2023 [40 favorites]
My wife shops “at” our local Target regularly. Which is to say she orders the things she wants through the Target app and then picks it up (they bring it to her car) on the commute home.
I honestly don’t think I’ve been in a Target in 3 years.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 7:05 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
I honestly don’t think I’ve been in a Target in 3 years.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 7:05 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
West Baltimore used to have a Target, thanks to some tax incentives. About five years ago, after the incentives expired, the store was closed.
Guess what the reason they gave for closing it was?
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:10 PM on October 28, 2023 [9 favorites]
Guess what the reason they gave for closing it was?
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:10 PM on October 28, 2023 [9 favorites]
I first started seeing the shoplifting crime spree stories a couple of years ago as a reaction to California's Proposition 47, which raised the threshold for theft to be treated as a felony from $400 to $950. This change was made out to be somehow contributing to the crime and Walgreens closing its SF stores. Nevermind that Prop 47 a) happened way back in 2014, b) mainly codified the limit that has been in effect since 2010 , and c) still kept California's threshold below the national average.
I wish I'd saved the article I found that covered how much this story was repeated in the media with no one asking questions. I think it was in an investigative reporter's own blog. The guy went on to dig through all of Walgreens' communications to shareholders from that period that he could find. The most common reason given for the closings was the cost of the real estate. Theft was not mentioned once. It's not illegal, he pointed out, to lie to the public or the press, but it is illegal to lie to your shareholders.
posted by hydrophonic at 7:27 PM on October 28, 2023 [22 favorites]
I wish I'd saved the article I found that covered how much this story was repeated in the media with no one asking questions. I think it was in an investigative reporter's own blog. The guy went on to dig through all of Walgreens' communications to shareholders from that period that he could find. The most common reason given for the closings was the cost of the real estate. Theft was not mentioned once. It's not illegal, he pointed out, to lie to the public or the press, but it is illegal to lie to your shareholders.
posted by hydrophonic at 7:27 PM on October 28, 2023 [22 favorites]
I honestly don’t think I’ve been in a Target in 3 years.
They are pretty common here in Chicago but I go surprisingly infrequently. One issue I find is that the smaller city stores all have different selections of merchandise and you don’t really know what they’ll have until you’re there.
I went in one a couple of months ago looking for a pair of cheap sneakers and they basically just didn’t stock men’s shoes at that location. I think they had one pair of Birkenstock-style sandals.
posted by smelendez at 7:54 PM on October 28, 2023
They are pretty common here in Chicago but I go surprisingly infrequently. One issue I find is that the smaller city stores all have different selections of merchandise and you don’t really know what they’ll have until you’re there.
I went in one a couple of months ago looking for a pair of cheap sneakers and they basically just didn’t stock men’s shoes at that location. I think they had one pair of Birkenstock-style sandals.
posted by smelendez at 7:54 PM on October 28, 2023
I second the recommendation for the If Books Could Kill podcast episode. One of the more important points it made (I thought) was that a lot of the messaging about shoplifting is largely being driven by the National Retail Federation, an organization that (among other things) lobbies against worker protections and minimum wage increases, and lobbies for more policing and harsher sentencing for shoplifting. They're currently lobbying for the passage of HR 895, a bill designed to help crack down on "organized retail crime," but I suspect that - just like anti-gang legislation in the 80s-90s made it easy to characterize any group of Black or Latine teenagers hanging out together as a "gang" - it's going to also have knock-on effects on people who are shoplifting but who aren't in the Shoplifting Mafia or anything.
posted by Jeanne at 8:03 PM on October 28, 2023 [18 favorites]
posted by Jeanne at 8:03 PM on October 28, 2023 [18 favorites]
On the subject of big chain drugstores, what the hell is their business model? A depressing convenience store that fills prescriptions?
If the latter part is the moneymaker, why not just make the whole store a pharmacy counter?
Most CVS and Walgreens locations are impressively unpleasant to shop at. An uncanny valley of filthy and sterile. They're usually large, but do nothing with the space. Often, they're right next to a supermarket, where you can buy the exact same merchandise for literally half the price. Oh, and for some reason, every pharmacy seems like it's at war with the concept of natural light. The windows are always boarded over.
The urban stores are the biggest missed opportunity. They could be bodegas, or actually help fix food deserts. Instead, it almost feels like they're intentionally bad (for reasons having nothing to do with clientele – the suburban stores are clearly renovated on a much more frequent cadence). I'm not asking for miracles, but could they at leasr try to be less soul-crushing than, say, a McDonald's or a Wawa?
I can kinda see how the only way some of their inventory moves is through theft. I genuinely don't get how or why these stores are in business.
posted by schmod at 8:19 PM on October 28, 2023 [12 favorites]
If the latter part is the moneymaker, why not just make the whole store a pharmacy counter?
Most CVS and Walgreens locations are impressively unpleasant to shop at. An uncanny valley of filthy and sterile. They're usually large, but do nothing with the space. Often, they're right next to a supermarket, where you can buy the exact same merchandise for literally half the price. Oh, and for some reason, every pharmacy seems like it's at war with the concept of natural light. The windows are always boarded over.
The urban stores are the biggest missed opportunity. They could be bodegas, or actually help fix food deserts. Instead, it almost feels like they're intentionally bad (for reasons having nothing to do with clientele – the suburban stores are clearly renovated on a much more frequent cadence). I'm not asking for miracles, but could they at leasr try to be less soul-crushing than, say, a McDonald's or a Wawa?
I can kinda see how the only way some of their inventory moves is through theft. I genuinely don't get how or why these stores are in business.
posted by schmod at 8:19 PM on October 28, 2023 [12 favorites]
On the subject of big chain drugstores, what the hell is their business model?
They are so awful, but to me they are really no different from Target, or Dollar General, or Wal-Mart, or Best Buy, or Home Depot or any big chain store in America.
To help rationalize my feelings of disgust when I step into them, I find it helpful to think of these as all the same store, kind of like I think of all sparrows as just "sparrow" even though there are technically different species with some minor adaptive specializations.
They are all soul-crushing (the stores, not the sparrows) because they are all the same store, with the same managers, the same stockholders, the same customers, and more or less the same crap. Drugstores happen to have pharmacists (usually), which Home Depots don't (yet) but they both are essentially fronts for quasi-legal money laundering.
posted by swift at 8:59 PM on October 28, 2023 [4 favorites]
They are so awful, but to me they are really no different from Target, or Dollar General, or Wal-Mart, or Best Buy, or Home Depot or any big chain store in America.
To help rationalize my feelings of disgust when I step into them, I find it helpful to think of these as all the same store, kind of like I think of all sparrows as just "sparrow" even though there are technically different species with some minor adaptive specializations.
They are all soul-crushing (the stores, not the sparrows) because they are all the same store, with the same managers, the same stockholders, the same customers, and more or less the same crap. Drugstores happen to have pharmacists (usually), which Home Depots don't (yet) but they both are essentially fronts for quasi-legal money laundering.
posted by swift at 8:59 PM on October 28, 2023 [4 favorites]
> I don't think chains have added staff just to unlock razors, for instance; they've just made it more unpleasant to wait around for someone.
I was amazed when shopping for toiletries at the Target in the San Francisco Metreon that they'd dedicated someone to retrieving items from the locked cabinets. I needed a few things & it was super busy, so I needed their help a few times & I never had to wait more than a minute while they helped someone else. So, one store is doing it right.
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 9:32 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
I was amazed when shopping for toiletries at the Target in the San Francisco Metreon that they'd dedicated someone to retrieving items from the locked cabinets. I needed a few things & it was super busy, so I needed their help a few times & I never had to wait more than a minute while they helped someone else. So, one store is doing it right.
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 9:32 PM on October 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
Two of the three “city” targets that have opened near me in the last 4 years have been within 2 blocks of a CVS and WallGreens or Rite-Aid. The only thing target ha unique d is a very limited clothing and electronics section.
Meanwhile in another dense part of town there are 4 CVS in a square mile. Definitely over Saturation .
I have been trying to do more in store and less Amazon, but
Our full service Target is constantly trashed and empty shelves, and things I need like deodorant and Tylenol are locked away. I have totally gone back to Amazon or the hospital pharmacy beacuse I could t find an employee to help me
posted by CostcoCultist at 9:34 PM on October 28, 2023
Meanwhile in another dense part of town there are 4 CVS in a square mile. Definitely over Saturation .
I have been trying to do more in store and less Amazon, but
Our full service Target is constantly trashed and empty shelves, and things I need like deodorant and Tylenol are locked away. I have totally gone back to Amazon or the hospital pharmacy beacuse I could t find an employee to help me
posted by CostcoCultist at 9:34 PM on October 28, 2023
I run a local news site and for some time, have chosen not to run most of the many "wanted" notices from the cops which tend to be very skimpy on details, accompanied by crappy photos and often are about thefts involving less than $100.
Target is a very, very frequent subject of shoplfiting notices. I drew the line a couple of years ago when they were trying to get the press to help them catch an obvious teenager who ran out the door with a $70-something calculator a few days before school started.
When the Rite-Aid nearest me closed two weeks ago, I fought off commenters who insisted that it "liberals, commies, bail reform" etc was to blame and I kept pointing out that Rite Aid wasn't the slightest bit shy about saying that they were closing stores because of bankruptcy, which was meant to avoid having to pay the opioid lawsuits.
However, I have no sympathy for the people heisting literally hundreds or even thousands of dollars of technology or home-repair tools or containers of Tide or other expensive products for obvious resale on Amazon or elsewhere. Two years ago, a security guy at the local Target was Tasered in the chest by a thief. Not okay. No one's stocking their shelves with 18 containers of name-brand detergent. I'm not talking about a mother trying to feed her kids. I'm talking about organized theft. We should not tolerate that anymore than we tolerate a holdup or a mugging.
posted by etaoin at 10:14 PM on October 28, 2023 [11 favorites]
Target is a very, very frequent subject of shoplfiting notices. I drew the line a couple of years ago when they were trying to get the press to help them catch an obvious teenager who ran out the door with a $70-something calculator a few days before school started.
When the Rite-Aid nearest me closed two weeks ago, I fought off commenters who insisted that it "liberals, commies, bail reform" etc was to blame and I kept pointing out that Rite Aid wasn't the slightest bit shy about saying that they were closing stores because of bankruptcy, which was meant to avoid having to pay the opioid lawsuits.
However, I have no sympathy for the people heisting literally hundreds or even thousands of dollars of technology or home-repair tools or containers of Tide or other expensive products for obvious resale on Amazon or elsewhere. Two years ago, a security guy at the local Target was Tasered in the chest by a thief. Not okay. No one's stocking their shelves with 18 containers of name-brand detergent. I'm not talking about a mother trying to feed her kids. I'm talking about organized theft. We should not tolerate that anymore than we tolerate a holdup or a mugging.
posted by etaoin at 10:14 PM on October 28, 2023 [11 favorites]
Holdups and muggings are robbery under threat of violence, sometimes even mortal. There should be a hierarchy and I don’t see shoplifting reports as particularly newsworthy or something that should be conflated with what people used to refer to as a “heist”
posted by Selena777 at 10:20 PM on October 28, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Selena777 at 10:20 PM on October 28, 2023 [3 favorites]
A couple/few things:
I chose the word "heist" deliberately because it originally referred specifically to shoplifting. It is not an uncommon, let alone, "used to" word. Second, some violence has occurred here with shoplifting--this week, a shoplifter fired a gun when he was stopped in a store a few miles from here. Third, rational reporting with perspective is very much of value, if nothing else, to calm the rumormongering that goes on on social media. And the store owners, including the little deli or bodega owners who are hit by these organized shoplifters, can take a serious financial beating. That's newsworthy to everyone I know. Many years ago, I worked on a very long and complicated series of stories about crime, that could have been boiled down to this: "It ain't as bad as you think." Since then, people's exaggerated fears have gotten worse. I don't think that means we shouldn't report it.
The big box places have it in their power to improve security by having actual people working. I have next to no sympathy for them since they've chosen profits and blame the public for when they make bad decisions.
posted by etaoin at 11:03 PM on October 28, 2023 [5 favorites]
I chose the word "heist" deliberately because it originally referred specifically to shoplifting. It is not an uncommon, let alone, "used to" word. Second, some violence has occurred here with shoplifting--this week, a shoplifter fired a gun when he was stopped in a store a few miles from here. Third, rational reporting with perspective is very much of value, if nothing else, to calm the rumormongering that goes on on social media. And the store owners, including the little deli or bodega owners who are hit by these organized shoplifters, can take a serious financial beating. That's newsworthy to everyone I know. Many years ago, I worked on a very long and complicated series of stories about crime, that could have been boiled down to this: "It ain't as bad as you think." Since then, people's exaggerated fears have gotten worse. I don't think that means we shouldn't report it.
The big box places have it in their power to improve security by having actual people working. I have next to no sympathy for them since they've chosen profits and blame the public for when they make bad decisions.
posted by etaoin at 11:03 PM on October 28, 2023 [5 favorites]
Yes, here in Seattle, (Ballard), there have been a lot of closures
Kroger tried to pass off closures of a couple of its QFC grocery stores in Seattle as a result of the passage of city laws increasing hazard pay during the lockdown.
Except that these stores were within a couple blocks of Safeway and other major chain stores that were both doing a better job stocking a clean and safe grocery store, and they were still able to pay their staff just fine.
Kroger was and is still making record corporate profits and doing stock buybacks. They could have afforded to pay their staff. The real reasons their QFCs were closed had nothing to do with pay, in any case.
Kroger corporate tried to overthrow the will of the residents of Seattle, bullying government with a public campaign to undo democratically-enacted laws that protected Seattle residents.
I have since stopped shopping at Kroger stores in this area (QFC and Fred Meyer) and have encouraged others to do the same. Kroger is just not an honest business. It is no exaggeration to point out that this corporation is run by people who have no respect for the rule of law. Shop elsewhere, if you can.
I live near Ballard and am familiar with the Target in question. It is in a poorly-positioned location if you need parking. It is also tiny and has accordingly poor selection for what people typically would go to a Target to buy.
If I lived in or near Ballard, I would probably not shop there. Its closure almost certainly has nothing to do with shoplifting, despite whatever horror stories FOX News will try to brainwash you with about Target in Seattle (or about Seattle, in general).
Further, I would encourage journalists to look into attempts by Target corporate to manipulate city government behind the scenes into lower wages or lowered business taxes, threatening a PR campaign based on existing anti-Seattle bias in centrist and extremist right-wing media outlets, if they didn't get their way.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 2:00 AM on October 29, 2023 [4 favorites]
Kroger tried to pass off closures of a couple of its QFC grocery stores in Seattle as a result of the passage of city laws increasing hazard pay during the lockdown.
Except that these stores were within a couple blocks of Safeway and other major chain stores that were both doing a better job stocking a clean and safe grocery store, and they were still able to pay their staff just fine.
Kroger was and is still making record corporate profits and doing stock buybacks. They could have afforded to pay their staff. The real reasons their QFCs were closed had nothing to do with pay, in any case.
Kroger corporate tried to overthrow the will of the residents of Seattle, bullying government with a public campaign to undo democratically-enacted laws that protected Seattle residents.
I have since stopped shopping at Kroger stores in this area (QFC and Fred Meyer) and have encouraged others to do the same. Kroger is just not an honest business. It is no exaggeration to point out that this corporation is run by people who have no respect for the rule of law. Shop elsewhere, if you can.
I live near Ballard and am familiar with the Target in question. It is in a poorly-positioned location if you need parking. It is also tiny and has accordingly poor selection for what people typically would go to a Target to buy.
If I lived in or near Ballard, I would probably not shop there. Its closure almost certainly has nothing to do with shoplifting, despite whatever horror stories FOX News will try to brainwash you with about Target in Seattle (or about Seattle, in general).
Further, I would encourage journalists to look into attempts by Target corporate to manipulate city government behind the scenes into lower wages or lowered business taxes, threatening a PR campaign based on existing anti-Seattle bias in centrist and extremist right-wing media outlets, if they didn't get their way.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 2:00 AM on October 29, 2023 [4 favorites]
I can't speak to the connection between store closures and shoplifting levels. Here in San Francisco, though, my experience has been that, for a period starting during Covid and until quite recently, I would walk into a Walgreens and frequently (like maybe six or seven times over two years?), see a person or multiple people grabbing items from the shelves and leaving unpaid. (The last time was last week, thinking about it, and I remember saying to myself "oh, it's been a while since that happened.")
Some times the shoplifters were obvious gangs. On a couple of occasions they exchanged abuse with the employees or were kind of violent -- smashing things as they left.
At the same time, SF has had a growth in open-air, ad hoc markets, where people try and sell pharmacy items -- razors, hygiene products, etc.
There is a right-wing push to demonise San Francisco (I read stories about our troubles in the Daily Mail!), I also see a large push-back that claims that SF and other liberal cities are doing fine.
I don't know what to say. I'm not a plant or a bot. I draw no conclusions about the connection between what I see and closures. But when commenters say that shoplifting isn't a problem, isn't on the rise, is only people taking goods they desperately need, I just quietly lower my belief in other things that they say.
posted by ntk at 3:55 AM on October 29, 2023 [12 favorites]
Some times the shoplifters were obvious gangs. On a couple of occasions they exchanged abuse with the employees or were kind of violent -- smashing things as they left.
At the same time, SF has had a growth in open-air, ad hoc markets, where people try and sell pharmacy items -- razors, hygiene products, etc.
There is a right-wing push to demonise San Francisco (I read stories about our troubles in the Daily Mail!), I also see a large push-back that claims that SF and other liberal cities are doing fine.
I don't know what to say. I'm not a plant or a bot. I draw no conclusions about the connection between what I see and closures. But when commenters say that shoplifting isn't a problem, isn't on the rise, is only people taking goods they desperately need, I just quietly lower my belief in other things that they say.
posted by ntk at 3:55 AM on October 29, 2023 [12 favorites]
At the same time, SF has had a growth in open-air, ad hoc markets, where people try and sell pharmacy items -- razors, hygiene products, etc.
I live in a part of NYC where street vendors are ubiquitous (even if technically illegal, except for the fruit sellers, some of whom even take EBT). I can buy large household appliances on the street if I want. They're not overwhelmingly not selling stolen merchandise, though it obviously happens and, yes, razor blades and laundry detergent are the things to steal to sell on the secondary market. Most of the household consumables are off-brands.
I'm pretty sure the only time I've had the opportunity to buy obviously stolen merchandise was someone trying to sell me shampoo(!) at the bus stop in Minneapolis. It was VO5 or something, too.
It's also worth noting that there are plenty of anti-shoplifiting mechanisms that don't involve locking up the merchandise. They're annoying, particularly the alarmed covers Rite-Aid had on some shelves (the idea being you'd open it up and it makes noise, but that's like five seconds if you're grabbing one item, vs sustained noise if you're taking a meaningful quantity), but they're all aimed at making it a pain to take more than one item at a time. Target is unique in the "let's lock everything up" move in my experience.
posted by hoyland at 5:38 AM on October 29, 2023 [3 favorites]
I live in a part of NYC where street vendors are ubiquitous (even if technically illegal, except for the fruit sellers, some of whom even take EBT). I can buy large household appliances on the street if I want. They're not overwhelmingly not selling stolen merchandise, though it obviously happens and, yes, razor blades and laundry detergent are the things to steal to sell on the secondary market. Most of the household consumables are off-brands.
I'm pretty sure the only time I've had the opportunity to buy obviously stolen merchandise was someone trying to sell me shampoo(!) at the bus stop in Minneapolis. It was VO5 or something, too.
It's also worth noting that there are plenty of anti-shoplifiting mechanisms that don't involve locking up the merchandise. They're annoying, particularly the alarmed covers Rite-Aid had on some shelves (the idea being you'd open it up and it makes noise, but that's like five seconds if you're grabbing one item, vs sustained noise if you're taking a meaningful quantity), but they're all aimed at making it a pain to take more than one item at a time. Target is unique in the "let's lock everything up" move in my experience.
posted by hoyland at 5:38 AM on October 29, 2023 [3 favorites]
One time I chased a Bevmo shoplifter through a big Costco parking lot, taunting him with abuse.
I don't think that story reflects on you the way you seem to think it does.
posted by aspersioncast at 7:34 AM on October 29, 2023 [22 favorites]
I don't think that story reflects on you the way you seem to think it does.
posted by aspersioncast at 7:34 AM on October 29, 2023 [22 favorites]
I say if buying razors is a problem we just stop shaving. Big burly beards for all! Set free your inner Bigfoot!
posted by downtohisturtles at 8:16 AM on October 29, 2023
posted by downtohisturtles at 8:16 AM on October 29, 2023
More like your inner MLB player...
But not shaving becomes so itchy and terrible. Maybe go back to a straight razor and a leather strap? Disposable cartridges have been a scam for a long time I think. Even the "disruptors" like Harry's and DSC seem a bit bogus. A six blade cartridge? Seems a bit much, (and don't seem to work all that well TBH, they get blocked up pretty easily and become far less useful).
But at least people are becoming aware of the lies that these corporations are using to close stores. Sucks when that is your store, but, maybe people will stop blaming the "armed crew of organized shoplifters" that are causing the closures, instead of the terrible business decisions the top management are making? But, Shareholder value and all.
Shop as local as you can.
posted by Windopaene at 8:50 AM on October 29, 2023
But not shaving becomes so itchy and terrible. Maybe go back to a straight razor and a leather strap? Disposable cartridges have been a scam for a long time I think. Even the "disruptors" like Harry's and DSC seem a bit bogus. A six blade cartridge? Seems a bit much, (and don't seem to work all that well TBH, they get blocked up pretty easily and become far less useful).
But at least people are becoming aware of the lies that these corporations are using to close stores. Sucks when that is your store, but, maybe people will stop blaming the "armed crew of organized shoplifters" that are causing the closures, instead of the terrible business decisions the top management are making? But, Shareholder value and all.
Shop as local as you can.
posted by Windopaene at 8:50 AM on October 29, 2023
For shaving, I switched to an old-style "safety razor" years ago. No cartridges, just the common double-edge razor blades that are like, 10 cents a pop. For me, better shave, far less irritation.
posted by xedrik at 9:00 AM on October 29, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by xedrik at 9:00 AM on October 29, 2023 [5 favorites]
Shop as local as you can.
So the natural response to a locked up razor shouldn't be to set up a recurring order from Amazon?
posted by Selena777 at 10:23 AM on October 29, 2023 [2 favorites]
So the natural response to a locked up razor shouldn't be to set up a recurring order from Amazon?
posted by Selena777 at 10:23 AM on October 29, 2023 [2 favorites]
I think maybe in 2023 we're just collectively over enjoying pushing a cart around the stock room grabbing our own stuff. Between online and curbside delivery, that really only makes sense for things you need to see like clothing or... maybe furniture? Certainly not razor blades and shampoo. I already know what that looks like, I just need it. Maybe they should just limit customer access to ALL the stock and have a selection kiosk, basically in-store curbside delivery.
Oh right, because they're avoiding paying an employee by making me find my own stuff.
posted by ctmf at 10:48 AM on October 29, 2023 [3 favorites]
Oh right, because they're avoiding paying an employee by making me find my own stuff.
posted by ctmf at 10:48 AM on October 29, 2023 [3 favorites]
Maybe they should just limit customer access to ALL the stock and have a selection kiosk, basically in-store curbside delivery.
Isn't this just talking about the undoing of the revolution of commercial spaces that happened about 100 years ago? Before that, you didn't do you own shopping, you presented a list to the purveyor of the store and they assembled your order for you. You also didn't have 45 different brands of bleu cheese dressing to choose from, so it was a lot easier of fulfill someone's shopping list because "flour" was just the flour you had, not a selection of 10 different types coming from 5 different suppliers.
Piggly Wiggly pioneered all this back in 1916.
posted by hippybear at 10:57 AM on October 29, 2023 [15 favorites]
Isn't this just talking about the undoing of the revolution of commercial spaces that happened about 100 years ago? Before that, you didn't do you own shopping, you presented a list to the purveyor of the store and they assembled your order for you. You also didn't have 45 different brands of bleu cheese dressing to choose from, so it was a lot easier of fulfill someone's shopping list because "flour" was just the flour you had, not a selection of 10 different types coming from 5 different suppliers.
Piggly Wiggly pioneered all this back in 1916.
posted by hippybear at 10:57 AM on October 29, 2023 [15 favorites]
I'm pretty sure the only time I've had the opportunity to buy obviously stolen merchandise was someone trying to sell me shampoo(!) at the bus stop in Minneapolis. It was VO5 or something, too.
Go by 1st and 14th sometime. Stuff plainly stolen from the nearby CVS and the nearby community fridge, a delightful combination.
That said, it's embarrassing how credulous some of the reporting has been. The Target on E. 116th that just closed was the only "real" (aka, original large format) Target in Manhattan and, being 10+ years old, would have needed a renovation to continue to meet standards. Meanwhile, they're opening a bit-larger-than-average city-format Target at W. 125th & Lenox (about a mile away, similar socioeconomic conditions) shortly. Obvious questions for a professional journalist to ask.
posted by praemunire at 11:33 AM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
Go by 1st and 14th sometime. Stuff plainly stolen from the nearby CVS and the nearby community fridge, a delightful combination.
That said, it's embarrassing how credulous some of the reporting has been. The Target on E. 116th that just closed was the only "real" (aka, original large format) Target in Manhattan and, being 10+ years old, would have needed a renovation to continue to meet standards. Meanwhile, they're opening a bit-larger-than-average city-format Target at W. 125th & Lenox (about a mile away, similar socioeconomic conditions) shortly. Obvious questions for a professional journalist to ask.
posted by praemunire at 11:33 AM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
Not at all Selena777.
We all have to frequent some chain stores. I am tied to Walgreens for our pharmacy. But we all have choices about where we shop. Ballard Market has always been great. Several of their young employees went to elementary school with my children. Which is crazy.
But, that is humanity, and community. These are your people, that you knew a long time ago,and thought were good people. And who knows how their kids turned out, you hope well, but, the kids these days.
"Thugs" are not the problem here...
posted by Windopaene at 12:09 PM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
We all have to frequent some chain stores. I am tied to Walgreens for our pharmacy. But we all have choices about where we shop. Ballard Market has always been great. Several of their young employees went to elementary school with my children. Which is crazy.
But, that is humanity, and community. These are your people, that you knew a long time ago,and thought were good people. And who knows how their kids turned out, you hope well, but, the kids these days.
"Thugs" are not the problem here...
posted by Windopaene at 12:09 PM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
even relatively mild social negative feedback
Your own story is that you pursued the boosting guy through the store causing him to trip and fall?
BTW, BevMo is a subsidiary of Gopuff, a multi billion dollar corporation that got fined $6 million earlier this year by the MA Attorney General for misclassifying employees as contractors and other labor law violations.
I think your anecdote perfectly highlights the disproportionate outrage we feel towards poor people boosting a few dollars' worth of stuff from giant corps that are stealing vastly more. Like, when was the last time you made a CEO trip and fall?
posted by splitpeasoup at 12:29 PM on October 29, 2023 [10 favorites]
Your own story is that you pursued the boosting guy through the store causing him to trip and fall?
BTW, BevMo is a subsidiary of Gopuff, a multi billion dollar corporation that got fined $6 million earlier this year by the MA Attorney General for misclassifying employees as contractors and other labor law violations.
I think your anecdote perfectly highlights the disproportionate outrage we feel towards poor people boosting a few dollars' worth of stuff from giant corps that are stealing vastly more. Like, when was the last time you made a CEO trip and fall?
posted by splitpeasoup at 12:29 PM on October 29, 2023 [10 favorites]
I live near one of Pittsburgh’s more infamous intersections . Some time ago, whoever is in charge (city, county, state - I have not a clue and don’t particularly care) made a concerted effort to make it less infamous. They were marginally successfully (it no longer floods) but ultimately failed. The thing getting in their way of reworking the intersection into something sane was a Rite Aid.
So I’ve been listening to heads explode all over my corner of the community this week.
posted by theBigRedKittyPurrs at 2:46 PM on October 29, 2023
So I’ve been listening to heads explode all over my corner of the community this week.
posted by theBigRedKittyPurrs at 2:46 PM on October 29, 2023
“when commenters say that shoplifting isn't a problem, isn't on the rise, is only people taking goods they desperately need, I just quietly lower my belief in other things that they say.”
What if the thing people are taking, that they desperately need, is money?
posted by toodleydoodley at 6:32 PM on October 29, 2023
What if the thing people are taking, that they desperately need, is money?
posted by toodleydoodley at 6:32 PM on October 29, 2023
Taking money isn't shoplifting. It's an entirely different crime, and isn't part of this conversation.
posted by hippybear at 7:01 PM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by hippybear at 7:01 PM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
And yeah, if I saw a CEO run past me with an armload of paychecks, with employees in pursuit, I'd probably yell at him, too. But that hasn't happened, yet. I try to do what I can, you know?
And it’s not going to happen, because that’s not how large scale wage theft or embezzlement work. Which means your approach here is structurally classist - ‘rich and poor being equally prohibited from sleeping under a bridge’ type stuff. What you can do is either do the same level of nothing for shoplifters as you do for CEOs, or spend some time and effort chasing after CEOs until you help in a theft recovery there as well.
posted by eviemath at 7:04 PM on October 29, 2023 [7 favorites]
And it’s not going to happen, because that’s not how large scale wage theft or embezzlement work. Which means your approach here is structurally classist - ‘rich and poor being equally prohibited from sleeping under a bridge’ type stuff. What you can do is either do the same level of nothing for shoplifters as you do for CEOs, or spend some time and effort chasing after CEOs until you help in a theft recovery there as well.
posted by eviemath at 7:04 PM on October 29, 2023 [7 favorites]
(A caution, however: my father has a story from his younger days working construction of an unscrupulous employer absconding with everyone’s paycheques - in the even more direct theft than embezzlement way. Apparently it was the last straw in a series of troubles for one of the other employees, who went after the employer and brought him (and the paycheques) back in the trunk of his car. My father decided that sticking around to find out how that all ended was perhaps not the best idea, and headed for somewhere a bit less laissez-faire. But it sounds like the likely ending from how things stood when my father left involved at least as much jail time for the chaser as for the chasee. Vigilanteism, such as chasing and/or physically accosting people when you are not the injured (as in stolen from) party, is generally frowned upon legally. And in some or most states (including some states that allow Castle Doctrine self-defense arguments) there are limitations to what you can legally do on your own in that respect even if you are the injured party.)
posted by eviemath at 7:15 PM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by eviemath at 7:15 PM on October 29, 2023 [1 favorite]
It wasn't at some huge retail chain, just a small tech startup. But I convinced the CEO and the founders to take a substantial pay cut (50% or 100%, I don't remember) and do one layoff, rather than a cynical two-layoff scheme they were planning. I convinced them to do it because their plan would have killed the company.
I’m quite sure they didn’t take a 100% pay cut and begin working for nothing.
How does this story relate to theft? Was the company in bad financial straights because of earlier CEO embezzlement or wage theft?
posted by eviemath at 7:19 PM on October 29, 2023
I’m quite sure they didn’t take a 100% pay cut and begin working for nothing.
How does this story relate to theft? Was the company in bad financial straights because of earlier CEO embezzlement or wage theft?
posted by eviemath at 7:19 PM on October 29, 2023
> And yeah, if I saw a CEO run past me with an armload of paychecks, with employees in pursuit, I'd probably yell at him, too. But that hasn't happened, yet. I try to do what I can, you know?
like you know how a lot other of moral philosophy puzzles are built around you seeing something and then making a decision, like, you see a starving man and decide whether or not to give him some cash, something like that?
why does it matter that you see the person?
no, really, why does it matter? it seems to me that if one is concerned with whether or not one is moral one would want to consider situations where you don’t see what’s happening more important than ones where you do see what’s happening, one because you’re not important, no one is, two because at any given moment the vast majority of things in the world aren’t actually in your field of view.
so really if you’re basing your sense of ethics around what you do or do not see at a given moment, it’s likely that you’re less concerned with doing what you can or being ethical or whatever and more concerned with whether what’s in your field of vision makes you feel all oogy.
anyway. i’ve stolen this line of reasoning but i can’t remember from who.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 9:18 PM on October 29, 2023 [3 favorites]
like you know how a lot other of moral philosophy puzzles are built around you seeing something and then making a decision, like, you see a starving man and decide whether or not to give him some cash, something like that?
why does it matter that you see the person?
no, really, why does it matter? it seems to me that if one is concerned with whether or not one is moral one would want to consider situations where you don’t see what’s happening more important than ones where you do see what’s happening, one because you’re not important, no one is, two because at any given moment the vast majority of things in the world aren’t actually in your field of view.
so really if you’re basing your sense of ethics around what you do or do not see at a given moment, it’s likely that you’re less concerned with doing what you can or being ethical or whatever and more concerned with whether what’s in your field of vision makes you feel all oogy.
anyway. i’ve stolen this line of reasoning but i can’t remember from who.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 9:18 PM on October 29, 2023 [3 favorites]
Me and a lot of my friends laughed super hard at the target thing in seattle. I used to work across the street from their downtown "city target" store two different times, and at least two friends worked there at least for a bit.
Unofficially, or at least not in any way i can provide hard evidence for, that store has the highest shrink/theft/whatever you wanna call it of any target store in the country. Visually, and anecdotally i totally believe this. Apparently it was a running joke among the employees, and they had stopped even putting up notices about it in the back areas. They would get shipments of pants and everything stocked would get stolen in one go. Sometimes you'd find whole varieties of things for sale blocks away.
Was that store on the chopping block to be closed? No, because it prints money despite that. That place is busy ALL THE TIME it's open. It used to be open even longer hours, and it was busy during those too. It's an absolutely brilliant location, and it's packed just like their giant brooklyn/nyc stores.
The stores they are closing were basically flops. No one ever went into the ballard one, and the u district one was basically used like a 7-11. There's no way they didn't lose their pants on those stores either, because one was an extremely expensive seeming time consuming remodel/rehab, and the other was basically the anchor store of a brand new building.
Has shoplifting gone up all over seattle? Yea i sorta believe that, but i also don't believe its insanely high compared to like, 2010. And, seemingly controversially, i believe that one of the real things driving it is none of these stores have any staff anymore. They're all jacking prices and announcing record profits, but there's no damn employees. I've NEVER seen any of these stores as understaffed as they are now pre 2020, and these were already stores where you had a question or needed someone to grab something and couldn't.
There's a deep, miserly cynicism to all this. And it bothers me a lot how much it plays into the "cities are dying" fascistic narrative.
posted by emptythought at 2:13 AM on October 30, 2023 [8 favorites]
Unofficially, or at least not in any way i can provide hard evidence for, that store has the highest shrink/theft/whatever you wanna call it of any target store in the country. Visually, and anecdotally i totally believe this. Apparently it was a running joke among the employees, and they had stopped even putting up notices about it in the back areas. They would get shipments of pants and everything stocked would get stolen in one go. Sometimes you'd find whole varieties of things for sale blocks away.
Was that store on the chopping block to be closed? No, because it prints money despite that. That place is busy ALL THE TIME it's open. It used to be open even longer hours, and it was busy during those too. It's an absolutely brilliant location, and it's packed just like their giant brooklyn/nyc stores.
The stores they are closing were basically flops. No one ever went into the ballard one, and the u district one was basically used like a 7-11. There's no way they didn't lose their pants on those stores either, because one was an extremely expensive seeming time consuming remodel/rehab, and the other was basically the anchor store of a brand new building.
Has shoplifting gone up all over seattle? Yea i sorta believe that, but i also don't believe its insanely high compared to like, 2010. And, seemingly controversially, i believe that one of the real things driving it is none of these stores have any staff anymore. They're all jacking prices and announcing record profits, but there's no damn employees. I've NEVER seen any of these stores as understaffed as they are now pre 2020, and these were already stores where you had a question or needed someone to grab something and couldn't.
There's a deep, miserly cynicism to all this. And it bothers me a lot how much it plays into the "cities are dying" fascistic narrative.
posted by emptythought at 2:13 AM on October 30, 2023 [8 favorites]
Mod note: One deleted. Please just focus on the topic and your own stories or personal point of view rather than trying to tear other members down. Everyone gets to talk / share.
posted by taz (staff) at 2:45 AM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by taz (staff) at 2:45 AM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
I wasn’t trying to tear another member down, and thought I had made that clear in my comment that got deleted. The whole crux of the issue of people’s response to shoplifting versus other types of theft is the interaction between the visibility of it versus something like wage theft or embezzlement and the classism around what acts we, as a society, criminalize and how harshly we punish different types of crime. That’s true both for legal sentencing guidelines, and for how we, as individuals, feel or react when we witness something happening. One of the things around being poorer is that you can’t buy privacy, and have to live more of your life in public. So other people are more likely to witness both your good days and your worst days… but due to cognitive biases as humans, will notice and remember your worst days more. Anyone engaging in vigilante acts to try to apprehend someone who has committed a crime needs to be aware of all of that context in order to act ethically.
posted by eviemath at 4:26 AM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by eviemath at 4:26 AM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
Also, in my now-deleted story, the person who took it on themselves to track down and apprehend the employer who ran off with the whole payroll also faced some criminal kidnapping charges himself, to the best of my knowledge. I’m pretty sure there’s no jurisdiction where an employee could use an employer’s wage theft against them as an affirmative defence for shoplifting. Given that another comment brought up the topic of “self-help” remedies against shoplifting, the discrepancy on that end is also relevant.
posted by eviemath at 4:32 AM on October 30, 2023
posted by eviemath at 4:32 AM on October 30, 2023
The shrink at the Barnes and Noble I worked at (and am now back at again) was 50% teenagers making off with manga and 50% petty, vindictive theft by the employees. Most of it wasn't even shit they particularly wanted, they were just young and broke and mad about mismanagement.
Now the store (which has unionized and is in the process of negotiating a contract) is so understaffed that we can barely check out customers, let alone get product to the floor in a timely fashion, and there's no earthly way we could prevent anyone doing anything. The best way to combat shoplifting is obvious, aggressive customer service and you can only do that when you staff the stores. So yeah, wouldn't be surprised shrink was up a touch in places, because they're understaffing their stores so badly. (The local Target is also obviously, catastrophically understaffed and I can't see why I'd bother to go in there any more.)
posted by restless_nomad at 5:34 AM on October 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
Now the store (which has unionized and is in the process of negotiating a contract) is so understaffed that we can barely check out customers, let alone get product to the floor in a timely fashion, and there's no earthly way we could prevent anyone doing anything. The best way to combat shoplifting is obvious, aggressive customer service and you can only do that when you staff the stores. So yeah, wouldn't be surprised shrink was up a touch in places, because they're understaffing their stores so badly. (The local Target is also obviously, catastrophically understaffed and I can't see why I'd bother to go in there any more.)
posted by restless_nomad at 5:34 AM on October 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
All the podcasts in the world won’t change the fact that shoplifting indeed is leading to the closure of stores that are really important to the local community. You can try to debunk all you want, but these are economic actors making rational economic choices. If they close, the community loses. For example. This is the kind of issue where we would do best to listen to local voices most impacted and not try to shoe-horn the issue into a “narrative” or counter-narrative.
I’m not sure about Target and RiteAid, but I know that grocery stores are extremely low-margin. They don’t have the wiggle room to allow “shrink.”
posted by haptic_avenger at 5:41 AM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
I’m not sure about Target and RiteAid, but I know that grocery stores are extremely low-margin. They don’t have the wiggle room to allow “shrink.”
posted by haptic_avenger at 5:41 AM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
We’ve covered the past couple years’ record profits of grocery stores (at least in Canada, and apparently some of the US chains as well) in another thread recently.
posted by eviemath at 5:49 AM on October 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by eviemath at 5:49 AM on October 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
All the podcasts in the world won’t change the fact that shoplifting indeed is leading to the closure of stores that are really important to the local community.
I am reminded of Lee Felsenstein back in the 60s admonishing angry youth in his column to break only 'the right windows' -- banks, not small businesses.
posted by delfin at 6:00 AM on October 30, 2023
I am reminded of Lee Felsenstein back in the 60s admonishing angry youth in his column to break only 'the right windows' -- banks, not small businesses.
posted by delfin at 6:00 AM on October 30, 2023
I’m not sure about Target and RiteAid, but I know that grocery stores are extremely low-margin. They don’t have the wiggle room to allow “shrink.”
Is that true? Some major chains did and continue to do well after the lockdown — in some case outpacing the economy:
"Kroger's profit also topped $2.2 billion, up 35.6% from 2021, outpacing the 7.5% sales growth for the year. The company also reported fourth quarter results that beat Wall Street estimates on Thursday. The nation's biggest supermarket chain notched a $450 million profit on sales of $34.8 billion in the three months ended Jan. 28."
"While the private company [Wegman's] will not disclose net margins, operating margins are at 7.5% – double that of the average grocery store retailer."
"Albertsons Cos. built on strong prior-year sales and posted adjusted earnings per share at the high end of Wall Street’s estimates for its fiscal 2022 fourth quarter and full year... For the 12 weeks ended Feb. 25, net sales and other revenue totaled $18.27 billion, up 5.1% from $17.38 billion a year earlier, when the top line rose 10.2%, Albertsons reported Tuesday. The Boise, Idaho-based food and drug retailer attributed the gain to a 5.6% increase in identical sales, which came atop a 7.5% increase a year ago."
I mentioned Kroger up-thread. I don't know about shrink but they have published record profits that suggest there is plenty of wiggle room to pay employees more, at least.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 8:27 AM on October 30, 2023 [7 favorites]
Is that true? Some major chains did and continue to do well after the lockdown — in some case outpacing the economy:
"Kroger's profit also topped $2.2 billion, up 35.6% from 2021, outpacing the 7.5% sales growth for the year. The company also reported fourth quarter results that beat Wall Street estimates on Thursday. The nation's biggest supermarket chain notched a $450 million profit on sales of $34.8 billion in the three months ended Jan. 28."
"While the private company [Wegman's] will not disclose net margins, operating margins are at 7.5% – double that of the average grocery store retailer."
"Albertsons Cos. built on strong prior-year sales and posted adjusted earnings per share at the high end of Wall Street’s estimates for its fiscal 2022 fourth quarter and full year... For the 12 weeks ended Feb. 25, net sales and other revenue totaled $18.27 billion, up 5.1% from $17.38 billion a year earlier, when the top line rose 10.2%, Albertsons reported Tuesday. The Boise, Idaho-based food and drug retailer attributed the gain to a 5.6% increase in identical sales, which came atop a 7.5% increase a year ago."
I mentioned Kroger up-thread. I don't know about shrink but they have published record profits that suggest there is plenty of wiggle room to pay employees more, at least.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 8:27 AM on October 30, 2023 [7 favorites]
There's a difference between profit and profit margin. The point about grocery store margins is that a small amount of theft can take away the already slim margin due to the nature of the business. Companies also operate on a store-by-store basis and close unprofitable stores. So the Ward 8 Giant in DC may close for being unprofitable (due to shoplifting) even if "shrink" overall isn't cutting into profit. I think it's pretty naive to think that Giant should just leave the unprofitable store open - that's not how doing business works, and it's not really a helpful take for the community there. People who actually care about keeping the store open would focus on better law enforcement at the store, Giant investing in security there, and city incentives that could help keep the less profitable stores open.
posted by haptic_avenger at 9:09 AM on October 30, 2023
posted by haptic_avenger at 9:09 AM on October 30, 2023
I think it's pretty naive to think that Giant should just leave the unprofitable store open
I agree with this statement. But I don't think it is true to say that grocery stores are operating on slim margins, when they are generally well outperforming inflation.
Some are even doing stock buybacks, and that doesn't sound like something a company would or even could prioritize if it was operating on tight margins, as you claim.
city incentives that could help keep the less profitable stores open
Sorry to keep going back to Kroger, but their attempts to bully local government in Washington State over wages should be instructive as to what "incentives" mean at a time of record cost-of-living increases and corporations maintaining stagnant wages.
To a point, it seems like these companies want people to work for free and are happy to piggyback on right-wing extremist media that calls cities like the one I live in a "crime-ridden hellhole", if it will help put more padding on already record-high fat margins.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:20 AM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
I agree with this statement. But I don't think it is true to say that grocery stores are operating on slim margins, when they are generally well outperforming inflation.
Some are even doing stock buybacks, and that doesn't sound like something a company would or even could prioritize if it was operating on tight margins, as you claim.
city incentives that could help keep the less profitable stores open
Sorry to keep going back to Kroger, but their attempts to bully local government in Washington State over wages should be instructive as to what "incentives" mean at a time of record cost-of-living increases and corporations maintaining stagnant wages.
To a point, it seems like these companies want people to work for free and are happy to piggyback on right-wing extremist media that calls cities like the one I live in a "crime-ridden hellhole", if it will help put more padding on already record-high fat margins.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:20 AM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
It's Capitalism all the way down...
posted by Windopaene at 9:25 AM on October 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Windopaene at 9:25 AM on October 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
"But I don't think it is true to say that grocery stores are operating on slim margins"
"Slim margins" specifically refers to the economics of the grocery business, where each item has a very small markup (i.e., "margin") and the business depends on high volume to generate a net profit. In these types of businesses, retail theft can have a big impact because you have to increase your (already high) volume to make up for it.
Since grocery stores are business, we can't just ask them to ignore key features of their economic structures.
posted by haptic_avenger at 10:33 AM on October 30, 2023
"Slim margins" specifically refers to the economics of the grocery business, where each item has a very small markup (i.e., "margin") and the business depends on high volume to generate a net profit. In these types of businesses, retail theft can have a big impact because you have to increase your (already high) volume to make up for it.
Since grocery stores are business, we can't just ask them to ignore key features of their economic structures.
posted by haptic_avenger at 10:33 AM on October 30, 2023
What about all the people operating on slim margins? If we're going to talk about systems, let's talk about a system in which people working even full-time can't earn enough to pay their bills. Why should we privilege the losses of a highly profitable industry over the needs of human beings trying to make ends meet on a minimum wage that hasn't been raised since 2009? Several commenters upthread have pointed out that the same organizations pushing the narrative of this terrifying destructive crimewave of shoplifting have also fought attempts to increase wages for their workers. They want to have their cake and eat it too: workers desperate enough to work at poverty wages in chronically understaffed stores AND disproportionately harsh penalties for nonviolent crimes frequently motivated by needs manufactured by depressed wages.
I say this as someone who manages finance at a place where salary is by far and away the biggest and scariest line item: Paying your workers a wage that allows them to participate in the economy is also a key aspect of doing business. Any business that can't or won't do that should not continue as a business. Do I flinch every time I run payroll? Hell yes. Would I agree to lay off staff just so our bottom line would look better, thereby redistributing, e.g., 6 people's workloads across 3? Hell no.
Also if we (the as a society we) paid living wages and had a social safety net, I'm willing to bet the crime stats drop precipitously. There will always be people who steal for reasons other than need but if we take it as a given that retail theft is up we cannot treat that fact as completely unrelated to the fact that wages are not remotely keeping pace with living costs.
posted by Fish, fish, are you doing your duty? at 11:18 AM on October 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
I say this as someone who manages finance at a place where salary is by far and away the biggest and scariest line item: Paying your workers a wage that allows them to participate in the economy is also a key aspect of doing business. Any business that can't or won't do that should not continue as a business. Do I flinch every time I run payroll? Hell yes. Would I agree to lay off staff just so our bottom line would look better, thereby redistributing, e.g., 6 people's workloads across 3? Hell no.
Also if we (the as a society we) paid living wages and had a social safety net, I'm willing to bet the crime stats drop precipitously. There will always be people who steal for reasons other than need but if we take it as a given that retail theft is up we cannot treat that fact as completely unrelated to the fact that wages are not remotely keeping pace with living costs.
posted by Fish, fish, are you doing your duty? at 11:18 AM on October 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
You can try to debunk all you want, but these are economic actors making rational economic choices.
This is such a weird line of thinking to me. First of all, no entity behaves in a perfectly rational fashion outside of some classrooms in the University of Chicago. People have sacrificed plenty of money in the past to stay [bigotry of choice]. Second...I mean...you're just going to believe that the reason proffered is the actual reason? Just because they said it? Here in the year of our Lord 2023? It's not oversaturation of markets? It's not relentlessly rising commercial rents? It's not the constant erosion caused by online shopping? It's not post-pandemic footfall drop? It's not financial engineering behind the scenes? I just cannot get my mind around the "sophisticated" line of thinking being "accept the corporation's word blaming those Bad [we know who!] Consumers as gospel even though there are multiple other factors we know that plausibly could be playing a role." I just can't.
posted by praemunire at 11:43 AM on October 30, 2023 [8 favorites]
This is such a weird line of thinking to me. First of all, no entity behaves in a perfectly rational fashion outside of some classrooms in the University of Chicago. People have sacrificed plenty of money in the past to stay [bigotry of choice]. Second...I mean...you're just going to believe that the reason proffered is the actual reason? Just because they said it? Here in the year of our Lord 2023? It's not oversaturation of markets? It's not relentlessly rising commercial rents? It's not the constant erosion caused by online shopping? It's not post-pandemic footfall drop? It's not financial engineering behind the scenes? I just cannot get my mind around the "sophisticated" line of thinking being "accept the corporation's word blaming those Bad [we know who!] Consumers as gospel even though there are multiple other factors we know that plausibly could be playing a role." I just can't.
posted by praemunire at 11:43 AM on October 30, 2023 [8 favorites]
I'm not sure how these stores in major cities still exist in the first place. I've heard it on good authority that Antifa and BLM burned all blue-state cities to the ground over the last couple of years, with complete impunity.
During the pandemic a lot of flagship stores on the Magnificent Mile in Chicago closed and the right-wing and MSM narrative at the time was that it was because of shoplifting, George Floyd protests, smash & grabs and so on. They ran and ran with the narrative and repeated until people believed it was the truth. There was just one problem though. Almost all those closures were planned and announced well ahead of time before the pandemic and reported on by those same media outlets and right-wingers as examples of Chicago's economic malaise under full Democratic party leadership. But the media either memory holed that news or were hiring extremely unknowledgeable writers who couldn't remember the half decade of Mag Mile retail and super-flagship stores are dying stories.
posted by srboisvert at 12:01 PM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
During the pandemic a lot of flagship stores on the Magnificent Mile in Chicago closed and the right-wing and MSM narrative at the time was that it was because of shoplifting, George Floyd protests, smash & grabs and so on. They ran and ran with the narrative and repeated until people believed it was the truth. There was just one problem though. Almost all those closures were planned and announced well ahead of time before the pandemic and reported on by those same media outlets and right-wingers as examples of Chicago's economic malaise under full Democratic party leadership. But the media either memory holed that news or were hiring extremely unknowledgeable writers who couldn't remember the half decade of Mag Mile retail and super-flagship stores are dying stories.
posted by srboisvert at 12:01 PM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
But not shaving becomes so itchy and terrible.
Only for about two weeks until your facial hair is long enough it no longer irritates the skin assuming you don't have awful problems with ingrown hairs.
posted by srboisvert at 12:28 PM on October 30, 2023
Only for about two weeks until your facial hair is long enough it no longer irritates the skin assuming you don't have awful problems with ingrown hairs.
posted by srboisvert at 12:28 PM on October 30, 2023
Since grocery stores are business, we can't just ask them to ignore key features of their economic structures.
I agree. I'm just saying that the facts do not bear out that grocery stores are operating on edge-thin margins (if they were, one would observe greater variation in profits and losses made across the business). Further, those facts as we know them do not justify the kind of extremist right-wing media coverage we see about cities and crime. It is instructive, even further, that the coverage that we do get from the media about grocery store chains invariably leaves out the record profits they are making as a broader business operation, despite record inflation.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:29 PM on October 30, 2023 [6 favorites]
I agree. I'm just saying that the facts do not bear out that grocery stores are operating on edge-thin margins (if they were, one would observe greater variation in profits and losses made across the business). Further, those facts as we know them do not justify the kind of extremist right-wing media coverage we see about cities and crime. It is instructive, even further, that the coverage that we do get from the media about grocery store chains invariably leaves out the record profits they are making as a broader business operation, despite record inflation.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:29 PM on October 30, 2023 [6 favorites]
accept the corporation's word blaming those Bad [we know who!] Consumers as gospel even though there are multiple other factors we know that plausibly could be playing a role.
I mean, at a certain point yes, you do need to take at face value what the businesses are saying when they leave a community, if you need them in that community. And when the only grocery store in an entire ward of DC says it might have to leave, you may want to consider whether what they are saying is true. Until we have state-run grocery stores, we kind of have to care.
Again on the margin comment - it's not "razor-thin margin" as in they are not making any profit. It's that grocery store profit margins are low compared to other kinds of products, so they have to increase volume or lower costs to compensate for shoplifting. This may impact the profitability of stores located in less affluent neighborhoods.
If you *actually* care about the neighborhood accessing retail, then you kind of do have to listen to these arguments. You can't both call for retail to locate in distressed neighborhoods, and then claim they shouldn't care about profit or are lying about their business.
posted by haptic_avenger at 1:43 PM on October 30, 2023
I mean, at a certain point yes, you do need to take at face value what the businesses are saying when they leave a community, if you need them in that community. And when the only grocery store in an entire ward of DC says it might have to leave, you may want to consider whether what they are saying is true. Until we have state-run grocery stores, we kind of have to care.
Again on the margin comment - it's not "razor-thin margin" as in they are not making any profit. It's that grocery store profit margins are low compared to other kinds of products, so they have to increase volume or lower costs to compensate for shoplifting. This may impact the profitability of stores located in less affluent neighborhoods.
If you *actually* care about the neighborhood accessing retail, then you kind of do have to listen to these arguments. You can't both call for retail to locate in distressed neighborhoods, and then claim they shouldn't care about profit or are lying about their business.
posted by haptic_avenger at 1:43 PM on October 30, 2023
A small margin means also that the economic loss from the theft is smaller.
None of it matters. Money is FAKE. You can't eat it, wear it, or live in it, so fuck it.
"Shrink" is more than just shoplifting. It's the difference between the inventory system's idea of stock-on-hand and the audited inventory. There are many ways to cause "shrink" and shoplifting is not the primary contributor.
Inventory is hard. I've been in charge of inventory systems tracking >65k discrete products (that's the smallest one) over 24-hour real-time sales and deliveries. Things go missing. Counts go wrong. Employees and customers and passers-by steal, or are given things for free, or legitimately purchase things, and the inventory systems in play have many many ways to lose this information or to not receive it in the first place.
Steal all the crap. Empty out the retail stores. Let people live in them.
Yeah yeah. Everything is the fault of Those Bad Poor People. We can never blame landlords, managers nor lawyers for anything, and no business would ever lie about how things are going, and they all have perfect inventory information. Sure thing boss.
posted by Rev. Irreverent Revenant at 2:01 PM on October 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
None of it matters. Money is FAKE. You can't eat it, wear it, or live in it, so fuck it.
"Shrink" is more than just shoplifting. It's the difference between the inventory system's idea of stock-on-hand and the audited inventory. There are many ways to cause "shrink" and shoplifting is not the primary contributor.
Inventory is hard. I've been in charge of inventory systems tracking >65k discrete products (that's the smallest one) over 24-hour real-time sales and deliveries. Things go missing. Counts go wrong. Employees and customers and passers-by steal, or are given things for free, or legitimately purchase things, and the inventory systems in play have many many ways to lose this information or to not receive it in the first place.
Steal all the crap. Empty out the retail stores. Let people live in them.
Yeah yeah. Everything is the fault of Those Bad Poor People. We can never blame landlords, managers nor lawyers for anything, and no business would ever lie about how things are going, and they all have perfect inventory information. Sure thing boss.
posted by Rev. Irreverent Revenant at 2:01 PM on October 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
"Pharmageddon": Pharmacists walk off job over working conditions
posted by Artw at 3:17 PM on October 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Artw at 3:17 PM on October 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
I mean. The Ward 8 municipal councillor could show community leadership by helping area residents get together and form a food co-op, that would not need (or be able to, if structured properly) make a profit, just cover costs. If the Giant did close. And if the Giant did close, there would be a space for such a community food co-op to go. Heck, there are probably also some grants the councillor could help folks find and apply for that could help with any necessary capital costs. Getting enough money to buy the building would be harder, but potentially feasible with a fundraising campaign. They might be able to negotiate with Giant to buy all of the store equipment though, saving the corporation the cost of moving stuff.
posted by eviemath at 3:23 PM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by eviemath at 3:23 PM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
I support shoplifting and so should you. i support shoplifting food, because anyone who doesn’t is foolish — you may find yourself down on your luck and need to shoplift food yourself. i support shoplifting medicine, same reason. i support shoplifting clothes and so should you — boosters get people access to clothes that they wouldn’t otherwise have. i support the practice of things falling off of trucks and when i see y’all not doing that i am fully baffled. think about your own interests instead of reflexively seeing things from the perspective of your vendors. they’re doing fine aside from some boneheaded real estate decisions, as you’ve seen if you’ve read this thread. people in your community, on the other hand, are struggling, and shoplifting helps keep them solvent and moreover helps keep money in the neighborhood instead of going to multinationals.
think from your own perspective. think from your community’s perspective. and don’t worry so much about the vendors you buy from — i assure you, they don’t spend nearly as much time and effort thinking about you.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 5:43 PM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
think from your own perspective. think from your community’s perspective. and don’t worry so much about the vendors you buy from — i assure you, they don’t spend nearly as much time and effort thinking about you.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 5:43 PM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
I mean, at a certain point yes, you do need to take at face value what the businesses are saying when they leave a community, if you need them in that community. And when the only grocery store in an entire ward of DC says it might have to leave, you may want to consider whether what they are saying is true.
Except that stories of shoplifting run rampant have been explicitly pushed by the right for the last several years. Why should I assume Target or Giant or whoever are telling the truth about why they're closing a store? Particularly if you're going to fuck over a neighborhood by pulling out, it's sure nice for the culture to have a narrative that makes the people you're hurting the bad guys.
Target are closing the East Harlem store blaming "theft". The internet would have you believe they're closing all stores in NYC (we've had to debunk this multiple times on local Facebook groups and Nextdoor--as alluded to above, us getting Target was a pretty big deal). I've literally never been to that Target. If I need a giant Target, I go to the Bronx Terminal one, which is actually quite close to the East Harlem one. I wouldn't be shocked if they did the math and realized one was surplus.
posted by hoyland at 5:50 PM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
Except that stories of shoplifting run rampant have been explicitly pushed by the right for the last several years. Why should I assume Target or Giant or whoever are telling the truth about why they're closing a store? Particularly if you're going to fuck over a neighborhood by pulling out, it's sure nice for the culture to have a narrative that makes the people you're hurting the bad guys.
Target are closing the East Harlem store blaming "theft". The internet would have you believe they're closing all stores in NYC (we've had to debunk this multiple times on local Facebook groups and Nextdoor--as alluded to above, us getting Target was a pretty big deal). I've literally never been to that Target. If I need a giant Target, I go to the Bronx Terminal one, which is actually quite close to the East Harlem one. I wouldn't be shocked if they did the math and realized one was surplus.
posted by hoyland at 5:50 PM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
My job, 30+ years ago was taking inventory. And running a crew, which meant I was responsible for their counts. The non-management part was pretty cool. We had a 10-key calculator pad on our waists. You counted what you saw. Was pretty zen in a way, if you could do it. Becoming one with the machine, and the stocking patterns was nice. I was pretty good. We had one woman who I could never beat. She was amazing. So fast.
But one bad section could effect a company's shrink. We had store audits, but OK. I accept my crew might of had some miscounts.
As I have said repeatedly in this thread, and I will try to stop posting, none of these closures are about organized shopliting. Corporate greed and upper management salaries perhaps. And it only hurts the people, somewhere far away from our headquarters, that shop there...
posted by Windopaene at 5:50 PM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
But one bad section could effect a company's shrink. We had store audits, but OK. I accept my crew might of had some miscounts.
As I have said repeatedly in this thread, and I will try to stop posting, none of these closures are about organized shopliting. Corporate greed and upper management salaries perhaps. And it only hurts the people, somewhere far away from our headquarters, that shop there...
posted by Windopaene at 5:50 PM on October 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
The corporations seem to be lying about shit...
And the "media" are repeating that.
What a fucking surprise.
posted by Windopaene at 5:52 PM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
And the "media" are repeating that.
What a fucking surprise.
posted by Windopaene at 5:52 PM on October 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
Mod note: Several comments deleted by poster's request
posted by taz (staff) at 11:30 PM on October 30, 2023
posted by taz (staff) at 11:30 PM on October 30, 2023
I mean. The Ward 8 municipal councillor could show community leadership by helping area residents get together and form a food co-op
Why should it be the job of people in lower income areas to form food co-ops due to lack of security in retail stores? What the people in Ward 8 want is for the commercial grocery store to stay open. For a long time there was no grocery store at all there. What they want is to just go to the store, like I do.
As a community advocate you don’t have the luxury to tell a retail chain to ignore the fact that a certain store is unprofitable due to theft/security costs.
posted by haptic_avenger at 4:46 AM on October 31, 2023
Why should it be the job of people in lower income areas to form food co-ops due to lack of security in retail stores? What the people in Ward 8 want is for the commercial grocery store to stay open. For a long time there was no grocery store at all there. What they want is to just go to the store, like I do.
As a community advocate you don’t have the luxury to tell a retail chain to ignore the fact that a certain store is unprofitable due to theft/security costs.
posted by haptic_avenger at 4:46 AM on October 31, 2023
We don't know it's a fact. We know Giant said it. But Giant is a corporation and so a sociopath. Apart from circumstances where it will be legally punished for lying, everything it says is only and always an attempt to manipulate others. The only thing we can tell is that Giant believes that saying "it's theft" is better for Giant than saying other things.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 5:18 AM on October 31, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 5:18 AM on October 31, 2023 [7 favorites]
Why should it be the job of people in lower income areas to form food co-ops due to lack of security in retail stores?
Wut.
Why should a municipal councillor help ensure that their constituents have their needs met through non-capitalist means if capitalists aren’t meeting those needs? Because helping their constituents get their needs met is literally their job. And if what you posted is true, then the capitalists aren’t meeting their constituents needs, therefore they need an alternate solution.
As to the constituents, should they not make themselves meals because it isn’t their paid job? Should they not bathe themselves because it isn’t their paid job? No, that’s asinine. People actively do things to meet their personal needs in all sorts of ways. By the “it’s not their job” argument there would never be any community organizations or volunteering. And yes, charity cannot meet everyone’s needs. That’s government’s role to coordinate. Which is why I suggested the municipal councillor as someone who could do said coordination, via building a co-op, not a charity (eg. most co-op groceries hire staff, though for many the option exists for members to contribute work in exchange for discounts, which may better fit the resources that people in a poor community have in some cases).
posted by eviemath at 5:34 AM on October 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
Wut.
Why should a municipal councillor help ensure that their constituents have their needs met through non-capitalist means if capitalists aren’t meeting those needs? Because helping their constituents get their needs met is literally their job. And if what you posted is true, then the capitalists aren’t meeting their constituents needs, therefore they need an alternate solution.
As to the constituents, should they not make themselves meals because it isn’t their paid job? Should they not bathe themselves because it isn’t their paid job? No, that’s asinine. People actively do things to meet their personal needs in all sorts of ways. By the “it’s not their job” argument there would never be any community organizations or volunteering. And yes, charity cannot meet everyone’s needs. That’s government’s role to coordinate. Which is why I suggested the municipal councillor as someone who could do said coordination, via building a co-op, not a charity (eg. most co-op groceries hire staff, though for many the option exists for members to contribute work in exchange for discounts, which may better fit the resources that people in a poor community have in some cases).
posted by eviemath at 5:34 AM on October 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
Having also done receiving and inventory at Barnes and Noble, I concur with Windopaene. There are so many points of failure involved in modern supply chains - the inventory on any given shipped box can be incorrect from the warehouse, the shipper loses shit all the time, boxes can fail to be scanned as they come in (or their bar codes can be damaged beyond readability) and the error isn't always caught, stuff is routinely misshelved, misplaced, and then counted "lost" and removed from the system, only to turn up again later, confusing the hell out of the computer. And that doesn't touch what must happen at a store that carries perishables.
And again, as I said above, the way to reduce shrink is not to wail to the media or to close stores, it's to staff the goddamn stores. Not to eliminate as many workers as possible and replace them with robots and self-checkout stations, which more than double the rate of theft. Or, as the excellent If Books Could Kill podcast points out, opening too many stores in an effort to drive off the competion. These are choices the companies are making, not individual consumers making bad choices. (And that podcast also points out that companies don't break leases - it's not worth it - and commercial leases are loooong, which means these store closures were planned years ago.)
posted by restless_nomad at 6:14 AM on October 31, 2023 [9 favorites]
And again, as I said above, the way to reduce shrink is not to wail to the media or to close stores, it's to staff the goddamn stores. Not to eliminate as many workers as possible and replace them with robots and self-checkout stations, which more than double the rate of theft. Or, as the excellent If Books Could Kill podcast points out, opening too many stores in an effort to drive off the competion. These are choices the companies are making, not individual consumers making bad choices. (And that podcast also points out that companies don't break leases - it's not worth it - and commercial leases are loooong, which means these store closures were planned years ago.)
posted by restless_nomad at 6:14 AM on October 31, 2023 [9 favorites]
Why should a municipal councillor help ensure that their constituents have their needs met through non-capitalist means if capitalists aren’t meeting those needs?
Because their constituents want what everyone else wants - to walk, unproblematically, to a grocery store to buy dinner. Not to spend their nonexistent free time operating a food co-op. You honestly sound extremely out of touch with real people's lives.
posted by haptic_avenger at 7:13 AM on October 31, 2023
Because their constituents want what everyone else wants - to walk, unproblematically, to a grocery store to buy dinner. Not to spend their nonexistent free time operating a food co-op. You honestly sound extremely out of touch with real people's lives.
posted by haptic_avenger at 7:13 AM on October 31, 2023
A grocery coop is a business, with employees and everything. It'd be a competitor to a commercial grocery store, not to the local food bank. The difference is in how the org is structured, not unlike the difference between a corporation and a 501(c)3. (Austin has one that is lovely - it's just a grocery store with some extra nuances in how it works and the opportunity for membership with some perks.)
posted by restless_nomad at 7:20 AM on October 31, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by restless_nomad at 7:20 AM on October 31, 2023 [7 favorites]
haptic_avenger, you're sounding like you literally have never heard of a coop before? It's not a commune.
posted by sagc at 7:27 AM on October 31, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by sagc at 7:27 AM on October 31, 2023 [5 favorites]
I've done tons of shopping - and buying gas, and gone to the pharmacy - at these stores, and they've never even once tried to force me to work!
posted by sagc at 7:33 AM on October 31, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by sagc at 7:33 AM on October 31, 2023 [5 favorites]
You honestly sound extremely out of touch with real people's lives
have you ever been to a food coop in your life sir
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 3:42 PM on November 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
have you ever been to a food coop in your life sir
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 3:42 PM on November 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
'America's Shoplifting Problem, Explained by Retail Workers and Thieves' (Vox)
posted by box at 9:43 AM on November 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by box at 9:43 AM on November 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
One night, Jonathan, who worked at the retail pharmacy chain, was about to close with just one other worker on staff when a man walked in with a gun. The guy told them to empty the store’s safe — he wasn’t interested in their personal belongings — and at one point suggested Jonathan check on his coworker to make sure she was okay. “That kind of stuck with me,” he says, “because the robber actually showed more concern for our well-being than my manager or the police did.”
Fuck that’s bleak.
posted by Artw at 12:14 PM on November 3, 2023 [4 favorites]
Fuck that’s bleak.
posted by Artw at 12:14 PM on November 3, 2023 [4 favorites]
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