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How to protect your store from Black Friday loss: a retail loss prevention guide
Although the retail rush of Black Friday can generate greater sales, it is also a time of increased losses due to theft, fraud, operational shrinkage and safety issues. The good news is that AI-based security solutions can provide real-time, proactive protection, even at the height of the holiday season.
Retail shrinkage is a year-round challenge that costs the industry billions. According to research1, retail shrinkage in the U.S. represented $112.1 billion in losses in 2022, accounting for 1.6% of sales, up from 1.4% in 2021. That's billions of dollars, in the U.S. alone walking out the door due to theft, fraud, and operational errors.
The problem intensifies dramatically during the holiday season. During times such as Black Friday, crowded stores provide perfect cover for shoplifters, high-value gift items become prime targets, and stressed cashiers are more likely to make mistakes. Traditional loss prevention methods—uniformed guards, basic cameras, and manual monitoring—struggle to keep pace with sophisticated theft tactics and sheer transaction volume.
It’s a real-time, proactive solution that monitors every corner of your store—from the entrance to checkout to the warehouse—stopping losses before they happen.
Retail loss prevention isn't a single challenge—it's a complex mix of threats:
The holiday season amplifies all these risks. What’s required is a solution that provides systematic coverage across all scenarios where losses occur. Today's AI-powered systems work like having dozens of experienced loss prevention specialists watching simultaneously—never getting tired or distracted, and spotting risks humans might miss. The goal isn't to catch criminals after they leave—it's to stop them before they do.
Repeat offenders cause annoying losses. You've probably seen the same person stealing from your store multiple times. The frustrating part? By the time security recognizes them, they're already concealed and the damage is done.
Hikvision's blocklist system flips this timeline. Using DeepinView cameras, DeepinMind NVRs, and HikCentral Professional software, the system creates a blocklist library of known offenders and instantly cross-compares anyone entering against this library. The moment a suspected person re-enters the store, security receives an immediate alert. You can assign extra monitoring or have staff visibly present in areas they typically target—often enough to deter theft. A major South American retailer deployed this across their chain, preventing countless incidents simply through early detection.
Shoplifting is often the primary reason for retail loss. What’s more, as retail theft tactics and methods have become more sophisticated, the threat is growing. Data shows that shoplifting incidents in the United States surged by 93% in 2023 compared to 2019, with losses of up 90%2. These challenges underline the importance of proactive measures, such as data and insights driven by AI-powered technologies.
Hikvision's AI cameras don't just record—they understand what they're seeing. Importantly, they use a unique shoplifting algorithm based on multimodal AI large models. While conventional algorithms analyze only video-based movements, Hikvision integrates both visual AI models and language models for semantic understanding. It's not just watching for "person puts item in bag" (which describes every legitimate shopper). Instead, it's analyzing the complete picture looking, perhaps, for people who are lingering alone, hesitating, looking around for cameras, or making unusual movements. In real-world applications, this approach proved three times more accurate than traditional video-only systems.
It also helps retailers act fast. One retailer using Hikvision's system in Singapore, for example, receives instant WhatsApp alerts whenever suspicious activity is detected. During the chaos of Black Friday, this speed can make all the difference.
Let's be honest about checkout challenges—they're not always about intentional fraud. During the holiday rush, honest mistakes happen all the time: scanning the wrong barcode, missing items at the bottom of a cart, or processing returns incorrectly when lines stretch out the door. But whether errors are accidental or deliberate, the financial impact is the same.
Hikvision's system integrates cameras, NVRs, and third-party POS machines to overlay transaction data directly onto video footage. Managers can search video clips of abnormal orders to cross-compare data between the POS order history and the actual camera footage. This capability is particularly valuable during Black Friday when you're processing hundreds of transactions per hour and supervisors can't personally oversee every register.
Self-service checkouts are often added during holidays to reduce wait times, but operational errors can occur. Hikvision's intelligent monitoring system supports self-checkout miss-scanning detection, safeguarding the shopping experience and checkout accuracy.
This sounds minor until you calculate the numbers. The metal shopping carts we use at supermarkets typically cost between $75-250 each3. Losing even 50 carts per location across a 100-store chain means $375,000-750,000 in replacement costs. More importantly, during holidays, cart availability directly impacts sales. Customers who can't find carts leave—or shop less because carrying items is inconvenient.
AI-powered system instantly alerts staff when carts leave designated zones. This not only prevents theft but also optimizes cart circulation efficiency, enhancing the overall shopping experience.
When theft occurs, speed matters for recovery and evidence collection. Traditional methods often require hours of manually reviewing footage from multiple cameras to trace a suspect’s movements—a time-consuming and labor-intensive process.
Hikvision’s AcuSeek technology changes this completely. Need to find ‘the guy in the black jacket with the red backpack’? Just type it and you'll instantly locate the person. Moreover, when suspects trigger alerts, AcuSearch enables immediate searches, displaying the individual’s historical trajectory and determining whether they’ve engaged in theft during their shopping trip. It also helps quickly trace lost items. During high-traffic Black Friday week when you're dealing with multiple incidents daily, this efficiency is crucial
Every prevented theft and detected fraud protects the hard-earned gains from your optimized operations and marketing investments. Learn more about Hikvision's retail loss prevention solutions at our website or schedule a security assessment with us before the holiday rush begins.
[1] National Retail Federation (2023). National Retail Security Survey 2023
[2] National Retail Federation (2024). The Impact of Retail Theft & Violence 2024
[3] Carts and Parts, Inc. (2023). New Shopping Carts vs. Shopping Cart Replacement Parts
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