At a Safeway grocery store in Denver’s Five Points neighborhood, customers planning to peruse aisles 2 and 3 first must enter a secure shopping area cordoned off from the rest of the store.
Security cameras monitor an extensive list of products stocked on those protected shelves, including batteries, lightbulbs, laundry detergent, pregnancy tests, deodorant, candles, medicine and baby food. Patrons pay at one of two dedicated check-out counters before being handed receipts and continuing their shopping trips.
The anti-theft measures at the store, 757 E. 20th Ave., don’t surprise some shoppers: “They call it ‘Un-Safeway’ for a reason,” Alex Haskins told The Denver Post in the parking lot, repeating a common nickname for that location.
Major supermarket chains are ramping up their efforts to prevent stealing by restricting access to certain aisles, installing merchandise lock boxes, hiring security guards and more. Corporate spokespeople point to retail crime as a major problem for the grocery and convenience store industries, though several declined to discuss measures at specific stores in Denver.
“Different products experience different theft rates, depending on store location and other factors,” said Amy Thibault, a spokesperson for CVS Pharmacy. “Locking a product is a measure of last resort.”
Often, such actions come as an inconvenience to customers, with the new security protocols recognized as nationwide annoyances. The union representing Colorado grocery store workers says they’re Band-Aid solutions to larger problems: shortages of employees and security.
“Locking up merchandise can be an effective theft deterrent, but it underscores the need for more staff and more security in our stores,” said Kim Cordova, the president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7. “With limited staff, customers face delays in accessing products, leading to frustration that often falls on our essential grocery store workers.”
The grocery industry, which is making less money now compared to recent years, predicts it will shell out more cash to hire and keep employees through benefits, training and other measures, according to the industry publication Grocery Dive.
Last year, the industry’s profit margin — 1.6% — was about as low as percentages before the COVID-19 pandemic years, which sent margins up to as high as 3% in 2020, when Americans spent months under lockdowns.
“It’s a marginal business. We work at the margins,” said Pete Marczyk, the co-founder of Marczyk Fine Foods. He runs a locally owned grocer with two locations in the Uptown and Hale neighborhoods.
His small business isn’t spared from theft — and he feels the financial hits personally.
“To us, it’s rent money,” Marczyk said. “That’s the money I need for tuition for my kid.”
Denver neighborhoods with highest theft rates
In Denver, several stores that have implemented some of the most extensive anti-theft measures aren’t located in neighborhoods with the highest reports of shoplifting offenses at supermarkets.
From Aug. 1, 2023, to Aug. 1, 2024, the Central Park neighborhood had the most larceny reports at local stores, with 98, according to the Denver Police Department. Union Station followed with 45, then Montclair with 37, Baker with 31 …read more
Source:: The Denver Post – Business
