First it was the CVS and Walgreens people talking about the wave of theft empowered by criminal justice reform measures like California’s Prop 47 and Black Lives Matter riots, and now even Best Buy is talking about how the crime wave is affecting its employees.
Best Buy CEO Corie Barry said theft is a growing problem at the company’s stores — and it is implementing added security measure to safeguard employees and shoppers.
“This is traumatizing for our associates and is unacceptable,” Barry said on a call with analysts Tuesday. “We are doing everything we can to try to create [an] as safe as possible environment.”
Apart from getting out of California, New York, and Chicago?
Barry said the company is implementing a number of tactics to minimize theft and protect staff and customers. For example, Best Buy is locking up more products and hiring security when appropriate.
Your new Best Buy shopping experience has been brought to you by the Pro-Crime Left.
But you would think that this might concern Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, who financed a lot of the pro-crime laws, since unlike shoplifting at CVS, some of this stuff actually serves as a platform for his child porn subscription service. Then again, Netflix is not in the hardware business.
The crime surge is becoming such a problem that it is hitting Best Buy’s (BBY) profits and could hurt its ability to retain and attract more employees in a tight labor market, Barry said in an interview Tuesday on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street.”Some incidents involved individuals bringing a weapon, such as a gun or crowbar, she said.
Why wouldn’t they? Unless they hit a luxury boutique patronized by the lefty upper class, they’re not even going to do anything.
The retail industry is struggling to handle the escalation in organized retail theft. A 2020 survey of 61 retailers from the National Retail Federation, the industry’s largest trade group, showed organized retail theft jumped nearly 60% from 2015 and cost stores an average of $719,548 per $1 billion dollars in sales.
And the costs will be passed on to consumers.
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