INDUSTRY FOCUS
Where real time results are more than cosmetic
The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a scythe to the rule book around managing multiple risks in stores and distribution centres (DC) where furlough-related reduced staffing levels and social distance requirements have created greater opportunities for both malicious and non-malicious loss as well as heightened health and safety challenges.
This is why innovation in the form of pre-existing, ‘hands-off’ technology, re-imagined for both lockdown and post-pandemic environments, is being deployed by retailers to not only minimise risks, but also better share the responsibility for them.
In this article, we look at two examples of how different technologies are being adapted to reduce and deter theft, enhance the customer experience and democratise health and safety so that everyone is empowered to mitigate risks, while managing social distance protocols in a post-pandemic world.
One has been successfully deployed to help fully re-opened stores that require strategic ‘eyes on’ particularly where they may be exposed to vulnerabilities of higher levels of theft and customer demand, while the other is enabling colleagues, both in busy stores and stretched DC’s managing exponential online demand, to manage operational hazards and help move thinking away from tick box ‘someone else’s responsibility’ to a new health and safety culture where all employees are engaged and invested.
Smart Dome
High-end security and operational technology supplier Intrepid Group has effectively re-imagined the way stores manage high risk merchandise in their aisles at a time when there are potentially fewer colleagues on the shop floor as a result of the pandemic restrictions and store restructures. It has introduced the Indyme ‘Smart Dome’, a new approach to “active” loss prevention and a theft deterrence that can be rapidly deployed into those ‘red route’ aisles that are more prone to shoplifting and allow retailers to respond in real time to events happening in store.
The technology, deployed in theft prone areas and issuing bespoke audio messages to those browsing merchandise in the aisle, can also alert store colleagues about prolonged shopper dwell times where genuine customers may require product assistance.
The solution, which is this week (July 22nd) being demonstrated on stand 65 at the Retail Risk exhibition in Hammersmith, London, starts as soon as a customer – malicious or otherwise – lingers in a space for longer than a customised time. At this point, Smart Dome triggers a bespoke audio deterrent message to those acting suspiciously as well as alerting store colleagues about prolonged shopper dwell times where genuine customers may require product assistance.
Audio messages, which can be selected by the individual retailer, range from ‘this area is under surveillance’ to ‘a customer advisor is aware you are waiting and will be with you shortly’ and can be deployed dynamically to drive a desired result, as specific scenarios dictate.
“It’s a real game-changer that can manage both malicious and non-malicious aisle activity in busy stores,” said Paul Newbury, general manager of the Intrepid Group.
A former retailer and LP manager, Paul Newbury added: “These are challenging times for retailers coming out of lockdown who have to balance the requirements of their genuine customers with the need to reduce store theft and shrink. This technology acts as both a deterrent to shoplifters that their activities are being monitored and as reassurance to browsing customers that a colleague will be with them momentarily.
“Importantly, at a time of fewer colleagues on the ground and the rise in violence and aggression, it can provide peace of mind deterrence to help avoid potential confrontation,” he added.
Operating as a stand-alone device that can be easily installed by the customer themselves, Smart Dome is currently being piloted by a number of High Street retailers and is already being rolled out by Superdrug.
A LP spokesman for the company, part of the AS Watson Group which also manages Savers and The Perfume Shop, said: “We were pleased to be the first company in the UK to use the new Smart Dome technology in our Superdrug store estate. We adopted the technology to assist with effectively reducing shrinkage in relevant stores.
“We provided a bespoke brief to Intrepid to ensure that the alarms were an effective solution to our business. We adapted the Smart Dome's to play wording when activating which was bespoke to our business to ensure it was the perfect fit for our store teams.
“We selected 10 stores where we knew the cosmetic losses were higher than the company average, and then installed Smart Dome in the cosmetics areas and other relevant areas in store. A team briefing document was also produced to ensure all colleagues were fully engaged with how the dwell alarms worked and the involvement we required from them to ensure the trial was a success.
“After reviewing stock levels at stocktakes over a period of time, the results showed an improvement greater than the company average for the departments, where the dwell alarms were installed.
“Following the success in the 10 trial stores, we have rolled dwell alarms out into a further 40 stores across the estate.”
The spokesman added: “Intrepid have been very supportive throughout the initial 10 store trial and again with the roll out of the 40 additional stores, it has been a pleasure to work together.”
iAuditor
Loss prevention is also part of the capability of iAuditor, an award-winning inspection and checklist app from Australian-owned Safety Culture. The technology that can be downloaded by every member of the retail team – from operations to health and safety - is a corrective action platform that is predicated on the democratised notion that risk is everyone’s responsibility.
It is now used 50,000 times per day across 85 countries to dynamically identify and remedy issues as they occur, and helping organisations drive safety, quality, and efficiency by reducing time and the sole emphasis upon health and safety teams to spot and correct issues.
Becki Hall, senior marketing manager for Safety Culture, which also operates EdApp, an easy integration training platform that uses video and gaming to drive home safety messages, said: “iAuditor has been a major growth platform for us during the pandemic because it provides front line empowerment for colleagues dealing with the fall-out of stores that have been closed for a prolonged period.
“It helps everyone and, put simply, democratises health and safety making it everyone’s responsibility and creates a culture where anyone can report an issue that needs addressing – it is a key differentiator.
“For example, checks performed on iAuditor as a checklist, can be used to identify issues when people go to venues where they feel that COVID regulations are not being taken seriously or carry out temperature checks on refrigerators to reduce the risk of stock loss when people have not been in the building for some time – it is a powerful tool when people are re-opening stores.
“It can also be used for everything from mystery shopping or checking whether fire doors have been left open to visual merchandising or brand standard checks - the range is vast,” she added.
Backed by powerful analytics and management information, it provides a library of more than 100,000 check templates – and counting – that can be made bespoke to individual businesses and eliminates time and the need for paper-based checks of old.
“Every template or checklist is agile and can be adapted as business needs change,” she said.
Incorporating photo and video, it is, for example, being used by businesses to monitor the use and safety of their ‘grey fleet’ - the use of private vehicles for company purposes, to ensure they comply on issues from business insurance to tyre depth.
“iAuditor also has an issue and actions feature where users tap the issues hazard feature to capture and alert team members when something isn’t right, identify and then assign actions in a dynamic way – it is as far as you can be from a tick-box exercise.”
Post-pandemic retailing is already proving to be both responsive and agile as it comes out fighting to secure lost footfall and sales. The lifting of furlough restrictions are already witnessing a greater interaction between store colleagues and technology to both enable and empower a new generation of putting safety and risk culture ‘front and centre’ of the ‘business, but not as usual’ resumption strategy.
