Canadian Retailer - Holiday 2016 - 31

RFID Ready

TOP SIX BENEFITS TO USING LOSS PREVENTION TECHNOLOGY

The acronym RFID, which stands
According to Tyco, the use of cutting-edge loss prevention technology
for Radio Frequency Identification,
can help retailers improve their operations through the following:
and refers to the technology that
uses electromagnetic fields to auto1. Increase revenue, decrease shrink and expedite the
matically identify and track tags
receiving process with source-tagged merchandise
attached to objects, has been used
arriving properly secured and ready to display.
within the retail industry for the
past 15 to 20 years. While the con2. Reduce losses from shoplifting, Organized Retail
Crime, internal theft, vendor fraud and administrative
versation has been constant, the
error with superior anti-theft protection and enhanced
adoption rate of this technology by
EAS intelligence.
retailers has been slow.
Now, in the last couple of years,
3. Minimize shrink and open merchandise with confidence
there's starting to be a lot more RFID
using a wide variety of hard tags, labels and sensors
traction within the retail world. This
designed to protect nearly every product category.
technology is all about getting an
accurate picture of one's inventory-
4. Maximize merchandise sell-through by reducing outa key piece of data needed to reduce
of-stocks and quickly replenishing missing items with near
shrink. Retailers need to know the
real-time visibility into loss events.
right amount of each SKU they
carry in their stores and online and
5. Enable leaner store operations with superior
what their customers' buying patmerchandise protection so store associates can focus
terns are, where their products are
on serving customers instead of policing stores.
in their store at any given time and
have them available when the cus6. Improve shrink visibility with new, deeper more
tomer walks in to purchase them.
actionable insight into sources of loss combining EAS,
We all know the cautionary story
RFID and video technology within the store.
of Target's expansion into Canada;
*Courtesy of Tyco
a big reason it was not successful is
because they didn't have the right
inventory on their shelves.
Wordplay: geo-fencing to stay ahead of retail crime
"With inventory accuracy you get a sales uplift and
While internal theft and one-off shoplifters hurt a rethat's what gets executives excited," explains Miller. tailer's bottom line when it comes to shrink, the real cul"RFID technology allows you to make sure what is in the prits are the organized, professional criminals. Technolstore should be in the store. RFID can be embedded on a ogy, once again, is helping retailers stay one step ahead
hard tag or a soft tag. It's a great tool in loss prevention."
of these thieves. For example, Sears Canada is currently
While no retailer in Canada has gone feet first into testing several products that geo-track the conversathe RFID game, mostly due to cost, C-suite executives tions happening on open source apps such as Twitter,
from sea to sea are actively watching what some of their Facebook, and Instagram. A geo-fence is a virtual barcounterparts are doing in the U.S. before investing fully rier; programs that incorporate geo-fencing allows the
into this technology. Sears Canada says it will test RFID administrator to define terms that once triggered will
in one of its new 2.0 concept stores. "It's truly amazing," send them a text message or alert.
says Berezowski. "Anytime you push a button, you know
Berezowski explains how he can set up a geo-fence for
exactly what's in your store." So, rather than doing in- Sears Canada's corporate headquarters that will capture
ventory once a year, there's an accurate picture at your all Twitter, Facebook and Instagram mentions within
fingertips daily.
that location.
One tool Sears Canada currently uses as part of their
"You can pick certain trigger words or phrases that
internal organized retail crime group is GPS-trackers will come up like 'hate Sears," he says. "For example, in a
for merchandise. "We can now catch more people in a rougher neighbourhood, we can put a couple kilometres
store and arrest them by using GPS-tracking merchan- geo-fence around this store and type in key words such
dise," Berezowski adds. "You can track whether they [the as 'stolen,' and 'grab and run.' From this, we gather inperpetrators] go to a location or, more importantly, to a telligence and can target people before action happens.
fencing operation where all the merchandise is being This will help with both our employees' safety and for
taken. We can then work with the local police to close identifying losses before they occur. This will definitely
down the entire operation."
be a game-changer for us."
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THE LOSS PREVENTION ISSUE | CANADIAN RETAILER

| 31

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Canadian Retailer - Holiday 2016