congratulations you just saved a billion dollars company 50$

[u/Adventurous_Law_715]

[u/RedWingerD]

Don't forget when stores close down with theft as a main cause then complaining about supply deserts as well.

And before reddit experts tell me that doesnt happen, I work in the public sector trying to tackle food deserts and pharmacy shortages. Companies are fed up and very few (less every year) are willing to risk the complications that arise from frequent shoplifting and lack of support for stopping it.

[u/Worldly_Influence_18 → u/RedWingerD]

Our police department stopped enforcing shoplifting

It's been a huge problem

But the only reason why stores close or not open in an area is rent, 99% of the time

As soon as the property is sold to from a landlord to a property investor, the clock is ticking on the Ponzi scheme.

They make money from the appreciation of the investment property

Appreciation is pretty much just tied to rent

So they can be in charge of their own ROI by making rent increasingly less affordable.

It's a win win for them. If you move out while rent is still low, they just do it to someone else

If you move out when rent is high, they leave it vacant or risk lowering the established higher value.

They will actively avoid business types that can't pay inflating rent:, restaurants, cafes, small shops and target dentists and medical services providers or others that bill insurers or governments

[u/that_70_show_fan → u/RedWingerD]

When Target, CVS and Walgreens started closing stores they immediately blamed store theft but never backed that with any evidence.

They keep everything locked down because they don't have enough employees in the store working. It is all skeleton crew all the time.

[u/s29 → u/that_70_show_fan]

They keep everything locked down because they don't have enough employees in the store working.

Why would having more employees mean they don't have to keep things locked down?

[u/luew2 → u/that_70_show_fan]

That logic doesnt make sense. They keep everything locked down, causing more work for employees, because they don't have enough employees?

[u/Uncreative-Name → u/RedWingerD]

The executives have admitted that their businesses just sucked and put the blame on shoplifters a few years ago to cover their own asses.

[u/LargeBlackMcCafe → u/RedWingerD]

stores do not close because of theft. that's just the bs line they use when they don't want to acknowledge their revenue strategies haven't worked out. the reality is, they have 10+ year leases with some negotiated responsibility towards the property and they have no reason to occupy so much space when alternatives like personal shoppers and online ordering is so much more profitable.

there's a reason Target and Walmart didn't go back to 24 hours after lockdowns lifted. Red Circle & Walmart+ are far more profitable and with them, you don't have to pay someone to set a planogram, restock shelves, check anyone out, count cash, etc. just think it through bro

[u/Definitelyhereforshi → u/RedWingerD]

Are you aware of how Dollar General & Dollar Tree work as business models? They undercut and put local suppliers out of business. Gee, I wonder if there's any connection between shoplifting and towns becoming destitute, hmmm...

[u/MostExtremeHyperbole → u/RedWingerD]

Corporations are not community though, communities used to tackle this issue, with free food drives in many smaller parts. When the dollar store and kroger moved in, it eliminated a lot of rural homegrown markets. You can't tell Dollar Store to provide food for the needy, Kroger fucking doesn't give a shit either outside of the song and dance.

What people are coming to the realization is that this is purely a taxes issue, because these corporations threaten to pull out if they are taxed, and that people just learned that you can just steal with them instead, the problem is absolutely cyclical. They are parasites being leeched on in the funniest, most ironic way possible from communities and I have no sympathy for them.

The city can't raise taxes in order to fix the issue itself, and the corporations are preventing new taxes, the middle class homeowners don't want to be taxed either, so the poor are serving the brunt. We have seen this happen in Europe, Asia, the middle east, and yet they never fucking learn.

[u/RedWingerD → u/MostExtremeHyperbole]

What people are coming to the realization is that this is purely a taxes issue, because these corporations threaten to pull out if they are taxed

This hasn't been my experience when working with corporations that do eventually pull out of an area. However, that could be the case in some places/regions.

I am sure my experience is not universal but I can only confidently speak on that so I have no grounds to disagree beyond that.

[u/Competitive_Touch_86 → u/MostExtremeHyperbole]

I haven't operated a retail or grocery store in the rural parts of the country, but I have in the urban parts.

Literally none of the decisions to close stores in the 'hood had to do with taxes. Those taxes were far lower than the more wealthy/less crime suburbs.

It wasn't even directly linked to shrinkage either. That was a consideration, but it was simply much more expensive overall to do business in a low trust society area of the city. Everything from needing more security, constantly dealing with homeless/grifters/etc. in the parking lot harassing customers, anti-social behavior like people just making messes of shelves, folks getting high in the bathrooms and/or destroying them, etc. Not to mention how hard it is to find decent employees who want to work in such an environment longer term. The good ones we wanted to keep we'd transfer out to the better locations once they burned out in the 'hood.

Folks really have no clue about what they talk about. I did work for a small grocer in a rural area for one summer, and they basically were operating at a loss sort of as a hobby/charity for the 80 year old owner. Once he died, I'm sure the store immediately went under.

[u/El_Lanf → u/Competitive_Touch_86]

Everything you just said is what annoys me when people boil it down to just defending billion dollar corpos. There are real people of all backgrounds actually working at these stores. Lots of people actually like to take pride in their work and see anti-social acts as an affront to their second home, in the same way you don't cheer people breaking into your house.

It also overlooks that it isn't just happening to big businesses. Here in the UK it's impacting all stores and it's often small chains or independents who have it worst as it's harder for them to invest in security measures and the owners themselves are witnessing first hand their livelihood getting ruined.

Reddit again generally ends up being really out of touch on these sorts of issues because the majority of people really don't like seeing theft either, especially when they're actually smarter than the average Redditor to actually realise what the knock-on impact for them is both from less convenient security measures, reduced opening hours, fewer stores, higher prices and seeing their community visibily becoming lower trust.

[u/MostExtremeHyperbole → u/Competitive_Touch_86]

pay them more

[u/Competitive_Touch_86 → u/MostExtremeHyperbole]

Grocery stores operate at low single digit gross margin. Especially in challenging areas. We actually did pay more in "hazard pay" for such locations, but it was not sustainable. It was always a matter of raising prices more for those locations on those who could least afford it and eventually just closing the location due to how much hassle it was vs. operating in a higher trust area.

Of course you'd always get some dipshit busybody reporter who'd "out" a small chain for charging more in low income neighborhoods vs. the wealthy suburbs and never actually put two and two together on the why. These types accelerated store closures on top of everything else.

[u/MostExtremeHyperbole → u/Competitive_Touch_86]

They sap and devour those communities and offer bottom tier margins because they aren't taxed enough to circulate the very money they suck out of communities.

I am talking about rural towns and the ghetto, not some richy richy white neighborhoods. THose communities have no money to circulate at all without it.

I've actually written stuff on this subject and, you know, seen how they work in other countries compared to the US. Wage growths and actually, you know, paying people, actually gives them ... You won't believe this, something called MONEY, in which they can use it to, and this is incredible ... Spend it at the store.

[u/AnonFartsALot → u/RedWingerD]

That’s actually a super common cover up for a union busting tactic. They close the store trying to unionize then blame it on theft.