Theft Barometer: Britons are Top

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Britons are Europe's most prolific shoplifters
(Filed: 05/10/2005)

Britons are the most prolific shoplifters in Europe, stealing nearly £4 billion of goods last year, research shows.

Britons accounted for about a fifth of Europe's shoplifting

Razor blades were the most popular item in shoplifters' pockets, followed by alcohol and toiletries, British-based Centre for Retail Research said.

Britons stole £3.58 billion worth of items in 2004, compared to an overall European figure of £20.8 billion.

The British haul was the equivalent of 1.59 per cent of the country's retail turnover during 2004.

Finland had the second worst shoplifting problem followed by Portugal and Greece. Switzerland has the most disciplined shoppers, where theft accounted for 0.89 percent of Swiss retail turnover.

Customers were blamed for 48 per cent of the thefts, staff for 29 per cent and suppliers 7 per cent.

The survey asked 423 retailers in 24 countries for their figures.

Telegraph

The European Retail Theft Barometer is a unique attempt to measure retail crime in 25 countries (17 countries in Western Europe and 7 in Central European). The study is carried out by The Centre for Retail Research, Nottingham, and independently funded by Checkpoint Systems Europe. The results are based on retailers responsible for more than 18% of European retail trade.

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Lord Ellpus did offer me a fabulous deal on some french soap recently.

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interesting...who was stealing the razor blades, men or women?

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Women, so the men can use them on their scratchy little faces!!

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Men. We certainly must give the females a reason to complain .... about e.g. left small hairs in the wash-basin ('sink', for our American friends).

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colorbook wrote:

interesting...who was stealing the razor blades, men or women?

Seriously?

As Walter knows, I have dealings with offenders (felons?) on a regular basis, and this type of thing comes up time after time.

The reason that shoplifters target things like razor blades is that they are small packages (easy to conceal), high value and easy to sell on. The razor blades, perfume, aftershave, let's not forget batteries etc etc, very quickly get sold onto market traders.

The sad reason for most of this is that the shoplifter is trying to pay for his/her drug habit.

I had one guy that turned up to Court to answer a charge of shoplifting razor blades, who got bleeped as he passed the security barrier. When his shopping bag was searched, he had a further forty odd packets in there. He was a heroin addict, supposedly trying to come off by using prescribed Methodone. It obviously wasn't working.

Get the hard drugs off the scene and the addicts weaned off properly (ideal world scenario), and this type of crime in most countries would halve overnight.

P.S. I have twenty radios going cheap, if anyone is interested.

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Lord Ellpus wrote:

P.S. I have twenty radios going cheap, if anyone is interested.

As Lord Ellpus knows, I had had dealings with the same kind of persons on a regular basis, and this type of thing comes up time after time: things just happen to fall of from vans, lorries, trucks ...

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And what are those Brits doing with all those hot barometers?

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Lord Ellpus wrote:

colorbook wrote:
interesting...who was stealing the razor blades, men or women?

Seriously?

As Walter knows, I have dealings with offenders (felons?) on a regular basis, and this type of thing comes up time after time.

The reason that shoplifters target things like razor blades is that they are small packages (easy to conceal), high value and easy to sell on. The razor blades, perfume, aftershave, let's not forget batteries etc etc, very quickly get sold onto market traders.

The sad reason for most of this is that the shoplifter is trying to pay for his/her drug habit.

I had one guy that turned up to Court to answer a charge of shoplifting razor blades, who got bleeped as he passed the security barrier. When his shopping bag was searched, he had a further forty odd packets in there. He was a heroin addict, supposedly trying to come off by using prescribed Methodone. It obviously wasn't working.

Get the hard drugs off the scene and the addicts weaned off properly (ideal world scenario), and this type of crime in most countries would halve overnight.

P.S. I have twenty radios going cheap, if anyone is interested.

I wasn't serious with that statement, more of a joke really. However, I didn't take into consideration that it could have been drug addicts! Thanks for the enlightenment.

BTW, what price are you asking for the radios? :wink:

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Theft Barometer: Britons are Top

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