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Show it "" They sure do V When variety stores began switchthe managers thought em ing to ployee thefts would IblTcWihro in the number of clerks handling cash registers. But the by insiders was more than offset by the increase of thefts by outsiders. 2. The removal of most barriers between goods and customers in stores using clerks. Formerly all merchandise was in showcases or on shelves behind counters. With open display, shoplifting became easier. Also, it's believed that success of stores emboldens many shoplifters in them to try it elsewhere. An old proverb says: "Opportunity makes the thief." 3. Improved display techniques psychologically designed to increase impulse buying. For stacks of nylons are more irresistible than a single pair they overpower buying resistance but also have extra appeal to shoplifters. The manager of one chain says: "We try to tempt people into buying and at the same time time you're in a supermarket, for a moment near the clicking checkout aisles and consider this : of every 52 emerging customersrone has Next shoplifted something. I " V self-servic- , Shoplifting is even more prevalent in variety stores. In department stores, it is so costly that many won't even discuss it Shoplifting, a polite term for stealing, is taking place right now in supermarkets from Maine to California. One supermarket chain reports that last year the number of customers taken into custody for shoplifting totaled 152,000. The , food stores came to 260 million dollars in 1960 volume of the more than the annual food-salentire city of San Francisco. There is evidence e total has now reached at least that this 280 million dollars. An equal amount is stolen from department stores, variety chains, discount houses, apparel shops, drug and hardware stores, all of which offer higher-price-d pickings to "respectable" thieves. In 1961, Sears Roebuck and Co.'s Eastern division alone, apprehended 2,500 shoplifters. Alexander's four New York stores caught 5,700; es food-stor- ' i - ft."- ' ;' r .:- I - - i - ' ' "' t j i ' : - V ' ' f n ; ' r I '. 'j ;'cy AV 1 ':-.?- - " A ' 1 'i ' J i criminal but Jhe respected Icitizen, rld the Christmas rush started. The FBI recently revealed that in the first three quarters of 1962, shopliftings reported to 4,836 police agencies (with jurisdiction over of the nation's population) were ,up 21 percent over the same 1961 period. No one knows the exact national cost of this type of thievery, but the best estimate is well over half a billion dollars, plus huge expense for store protection, guards, detectives, lawyers, special packaging, and mechanical equipment. And this total cost is added, of course, to your bill. Shoplifting has become so widespread and expensive that in the past eight years 46 states two-thir- JSP I " NG fr in 1962 the total had risen to 6,500 even before i. ' ce Some people contend there is a fourth cause for increased shoplifting: declining morality. And there is ample evidence of changed attitudes among youngsters. Store managers, protection chiefs, and detectives all report a growing "boldness" on the part of teen-ag- e shoplifters. They are cynical about their thievery, defiant when 1L thief-isritanunderwo- 1 tempt them into stealing." OOP ILV. The ' u -! V e, self-servi- trade magazine ProgressivGrocerj after an exhaustive study, concluded that shoplifting in ' ' ' , have enacted laws specifically designed to help North Carolina has engaged merchants fight it a former FBI agent to give antishoplifting instructions to store managers, clerks, and special 'officers. He" reports that North Carolina shoplifters are taking 15 million dollars worth of merchandise a year the state's most costly crime, far outranking embezzlement, automobile theft, and holdups of all kinds. This upsurge in shoplifting is attributed mainly to three developments: 1. The advent and expansion of stores. One Minnesota store owner says: "In we ask our customers to help themselves. self-servi-ce self-servi-ce, Family Weekly, Marth 17. tm high-inco- ds -- apprehended, rarely show remorse when proved suburb guilty. One merchant in a tells me that out of several hundred youngsters he has caught only one seemed to feel he had done anything wrong. The others were sorry ..theyhad been caught,, not tlmt standard reaction is casual assumption that all can be set right by paying for the goods. Reactions of parents are equally distressing: a few bring the child back to the store to apolo- , gize, but most parents in this me well-to-d- o I - 7 ! com- munity either (a) stop trading at that particular store or '(b) becomehlghT7ThignantaWor-protective- , claiming the manager doesn't know what he's talking about: "Why, Junior goes around all the time with $5 in his pocket!" IJ AX parents are often responsible for juvenile shoplifting. A mother will come in with a see him take three- - or pack of gum or a candy bar, then neither offepto pay nor ' make him put it back. Many parents shrug off the comic book "borrowed" from a store rack as "a childish prank." Later, when the child comes home with a handsome sweater or an expensive lipstick, the mother casually accepts the explanation that "Sue gave it to me." Few people realize the extent of teen-ag- e shoplifting. Out of 7,500 confessed shoplifters last four-year-ol- d, PHOTOGKAfH BY AKTHUt LEIPZIG |