THE STORE OF THE FUTURE 2012-15

The Centre for Retail Research has been commissioned by Visa Europe to investigate the Store of the Future 2012-15 by interviewing 300 retailers (27,000 stores and €308bn sales) in seven European countries and 1,000 shoppers.

The Report itself has not been published and is confidential to Visa. It deals with the use of technology by customers, shopping by mobile/cellphone, virtual shopping for fashion, changes in payment systems, green retailing, the use of physical stores for Internet shopping and many other topics of customer and retail interest.

There are two briefing papers, which can be downloaded here

Also have a look at these to see what is possible .....

smart dressing room
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VII-xdg5Ak

electronic shopping
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSlEa1udYGw

A supermarket, but not as we know it http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7477124.stm

GLOBAL RETAIL THEFT BAROMETER 2007.

The Global Retail Theft Barometer (GRTB) was published in November 2007. All respondents to the survey automatically receive a copy of the survey. The GRTB is the largest survey of retail crime in the world and provides results from 32 countries on three continents, 820 retail corporations, 138,603 stores with combined sales of €948 billion.

If you wish to receive a copy, please go to the Global Theft Barometer page and download an order form.

A summary of the Survey can be seen here ………

Retail Ethics and Green Retailing 2007: More than plastic bags?

There is a plethora of green announcements by retailers, all keen to show they are environmentally conscious. The future of UK retailing - for the moment at least - is green and very heartwarming.

Every major supermarket trumpets its green credentials, its healthy eating range, its policies to combat carbon emissions and reduce waste, and the ethical producers it uses.

• This season, People Tree became the first UK fashion house to gain both Fairtrade and Soil Association accreditation.
• Oasis, Topshop, Tesco and Marks & Spencer stock organic and Fairtrade collections.
• The Co-op has majored on Fairtrade products for some years and its own-brand black chocolate and own-brand coffee is exclusively Fairtrade.

Points to watch.

• Customers and green organisations will be anxious to see that retailers carry out all their promises and will rub their noses in it if any are unfulfilled.
• Expect greater regulations - from the UK or the EU - which will make what now seem far-sighted approaches obligatory. Let's think what 2012 will look like and what the regulations will be like then! Expect a lot of fuss about all this.
• Customers will expect environmental transparency - "prove your eggs are actually free range" "prove your sweaters are not produced by slave labour" and expect the internet to be used a great deal by savvy suppliers to prove this.
• We all love small shops (well, not all the time) but expect the multiples to be faster and more informative about this than smaller retailers.
• There will be new environmentally-friendly retailers who will set up their stalls on the moral high ground. In a year or two, they may find it tough going against UK multiples on a mission.
• Getting into bed with Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth will prove to be a t-e-r-r-I-b-l-e mistake and retailers will find they will be eaten alive by these characters.

Download the full report (PDF) Here

Cheque Use and Payment Systems in UK Retailing

The Centre for Retail Research was commissioned by Visa Europe to investigate the major trends in payment systems used in retailing and the actual costs that payments systems impose upon retailers. The research was not focused on cheques, but it just happened that the report came when there was a lot of media debate about cheque use.

Key retailers such as Boots, Dixons (DSGi), BP, Spar and (from August 2007) Sainsbury's have stopped taking cheques and our view is that within two years the majority of stores will refuse cheques.

This is because very few customers now use cheques, they are administratively inconvenient, and carry a high fraud risk for retailers. Chip and PIN carries a low fraud risk, so debit cards are currently where the action is.

We estimated the costs of different payment systems for Visa. Cash was the most expensive, after allowing for bank charges, security and count costs etc.

Download the full report (PDF) Here

New Powers of Arrest for Private Citizens

Thinking of arresting someone? The powers of arrest of the general public in England and Wales have been changed as a result of the Serious and Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 (SOCPA), which came into effect at the beginning of 2006.

You can download here an article by Prof Joshua Bamfield (Centre of Retail Research) that summarises the new position for private individuals and security officers. This article was originally published in Professional Security Magazine (http://www.professionalsecurity.co.uk/).

Download here

Black and Minority Ethnic Retailers 2006

Black and Minority Ethnic Retailers 2006

A new Report from the Centre for Retail Research discusses the financing and progress of Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) retailers in the UK and how it can be developed.

The Report, Diversity in Shopping: A Report on UK Black and Minority Ethnic Retail Businesses, provides accurate estimates for the first time of the size of the BME retail sector:

• 68,000 BME retailers
• almost 4,000 BME wholesalers
• 373000 employees
• combined turnover of £32.96 billion

Diversity in Shopping classifies BME retailers into four categories: traditionalist niche, conventional mainstream, niche player and progressive mainstream.

You can download a synopsis of the Report here >> or

The Report was commissioned by ATL (Yorkshire) Ltd.

Chip and PIN, research for Visa UK

Research published in February 2006 for VISA UK showed significant cost-reductions gained by large and small retailers from the use of Chip and PIN. The study (The Retailer Experience of Chip and PIN ) carried out by the Centre for Retail Research was based on findings from 600 retailers with combined turnovers of £89 billion (38.2% of total retail sales).

Our Report found that retailers using Chip and PIN achieved total reductions during the 12 months to February 2006 of:

• Card fraud down by £48.8 million (fall of 38.2%)
• Faster transaction speeds saved £24 million
• Customers were more willing to use cards than before, achieving cost savings for retailers in supervision, till use and back-office systems of £58.7 million.
• Fewer till rolls saved retailers (and the environment) £13.4 million pa.

Read more about this report >>

WHAT SOCIETY PAYS FOR CRIME AGAINST SHOPS 2005

New research by the Centre for Retail Research (based solely on national figures from the Home Office, Office of National Statistics, Scottish Office and the British Retail Consortium) show that the costs suffered by society as a result of retail crime are as large again as the crime-related losses of retailers.

The total cost to society of shop thieves is a massive £3.442 billion (equivalent to £115.91 for every UK taxpayer).

• Almost one-half of this is the value stolen from retailers - £1.711 billion.
• The public pays a further £1.731 billion (50.3% of the full total) through Police, Courts, and the Criminal Justice System dealing with thieves, as well as business disruption, retail security costs, and Government tax losses caused by retail crime.

These costs represent a considerable waste of national resources and could entirely fund a combination of 11,700 more beat constables, 9230 nurses, 5500 more classroom teachers, and 64 million new books in school libraries.

Read more about this report >>

FEMALE OFFENDERS

Women may be the dominant sex on the High Street, but it is men who love going down the aisle for the wrong reasons, according to our latest in-depth retail crime research.

The average amounts stolen by both men and women are similar (£83), but in the peak ages of offending (21 to 23 years) men steal an average of £163.64, compared to £92.84 for women. Females continue stealing on average into their forties, when many male offenders have given up.

Small-scale theft account for less than one third of the total customer theft while around 22 per cent is theft of items of more than £500. In gender terms what people steal is a differentiator with women targeting clothes, grocery, perfumery, toiletries and health products with men cornering the electronic black market with TVs, hairdryers, electrical toothbrushes and power tools on their shopping lists as well as hardware, DIY and CDs.

Theft by retail staff is on the increase across Europe. UK figures show that women are playing an active role, although there are still more men on the take and stealing more. The figures show that of the 2,476 staff thefts reported during a 12-month period by 14 retailers, 1,209 were women stealing an average of £816 per offence, while 1,277 were men whose average theft was £919.68. The women involved were in this case older than the men and the more prolific female offenders – those stealing more than £10,000 – stole more than 40 per cent more than their male counterparts.