Cheese past the checkout – Kommersant

The desire of large Russian retailers to modernize stores with self-checkouts to reduce shopping time and save on cashier staff seems to be running into social barriers. This was made clear by the recent mass discussion on Twitter about the shoplifting phenomenon.

For several days, Twitter users have been actively sharing stories about how they break through half of the goods at self-checkout checkouts, change expensive products for cheaper counterparts, citing, for example, a limited budget while studying. “For dinner, dumplings with suluguni, which I punched like cheap dumplings,” one Twitter user shares, adding that she managed to “shoplift the cheese”. It, judging by the posts, was about a well-known network of products for a healthy diet.

Other users have reported swapping mint and basil for parsley, and expensive tomatoes for cheap ones. “I wanted a luxurious life, but there was no money at all,” one of the participants in the discussion reports.

Judging by the messages on Twitter, shoplifters in Russia do not believe that they are doing something illegal. In attempts to condemn this practice, they see only “protection of capitalists”, being sure that retailers are ready to write off the loss of a certain amount of products.

But, judging by world practice, the reaction of retail chains is likely to follow. As the British portal Mirror recently reported, the American grocery chain Giant, having noticed an increase in the number of theft of products, limited sales through self-service checkouts to 20 items. Customers with a large number of items in their shopping cart will have to use checkouts with cashiers. The top manager of Giant quoted in the Mirror publication explained that the unpopular measure is needed to reduce the impact of thefts on the business of the network.

Meanwhile, my sources in the market say that for Russian retailers, the topic of shoplifting remains taboo: it is believed that mentioning it can encourage people to steal. Vkusvill says that they “build relationships with customers on honesty” and no additional control measures have been introduced recently. Although buyers note the appearance at the self-service checkouts in some stores of employees who can monitor the behavior of customers. At some points of purchase, they can even check.

Russian retailers have yet to find a balance between the desire to maintain the benefits of self-service checkouts and theft. Cashiers should not say goodbye to the profession just yet. And consumers should probably prepare for a reduction in the number of self-checkouts and new security measures from stores.