A NEW strategy involving social media has become a successful option for small businesses to combat brazen shoplifters in the region.
All small businesses are continuing to find new ways to deter and prevent shoplifting in their stores, with posts about the incidents online a popular strategy.
Bare Necessities Lingerie became the most recent Mount Gambier business to try its hand at the tactic.
After noticing some items had been stolen from her store and having a “reasonably good” indication of who the thieves were, owner Sharon Tuffnell used the social media platform to call on the community to help.
“I was hoping to not have to take police action and the people who took the items would see it and come back in and pay for it,” she said.
“It certainly got the result we were hoping for as the incident has almost been resolved.”
Ms Tuffnell said she was inspired to publish a post detailing the incident after seeing the success of nearby store Lima & Co.
On Boxing day, a number of items were stolen from Lima & Co and the store owners elected to post security camera footage in an attempt to identify the thief.
“Lima & Co and a couple of other businesses had been targeted by theft and took the action of putting it on social media, so I thought I could only have a go,” Ms Tuffnell said.
“I fell short of confronting the people at the time so I thought I’d put it up just to let people know we were aware it had happened.”
Ms Tuffnell said the intention of the post was not to “name and shame”, but instead give the thieves an opportunity to own up to their mistake.
“We do not bite, we are not nasty people, so I just wanted to give them an opportunity to be honest with themselves and be honest with us,” Ms Tuffnell said.
“If they can learn from it then it might stop their actions down the track.”
While the post was considered contentious by some members of the public, the overall response was overwhelmingly positive.
“For the post to reach over 20,000 people was amazing, it was not our intention and it was such an unexpected response,” she said.
“Most of it was positive, people were proud of us for standing up for our business and other businesses in the region.
“It also led to some people realising we stocked certain products and it also alerted people that we were still here, so that was a positive.”
Although the strategy produced some positive outcomes for the business, Ms Tuffnell admitted shoplifting was still a major challenge for the retail industry.
“When it comes to the loss of time and money caused by shoplifters it really does effect the operation of the business,” she said.
“It happens a lot more than what people realise and it makes you feel a bit used because it can feel like they are taking advantage of your honesty and friendliness.”
