The Rise of Organized Retail Crime at Big Box Stores

Joe Weisenthal (0:03)

Hello, Odd Lots listeners, I'm Joe Weisenthal.

Tracy Alloway (0:06)

And I'm Tracy Alloway.

Joe Weisenthal (0:07)

We're the hosts of the Odd Lots podcast, and we've got something exciting for you.

Tracy Alloway (0:11)

That's right. So one of the best parts of hosting our podcast is we get to actually meet and interact with our listeners. And we know we have some listeners over in Los Angeles.

Joe Weisenthal (0:21)

That's right. So if you're in LA, we're going to be recording a live show, some live recordings at the Vermont Theater in Hollywood on September 17th.

Tracy Alloway (0:30)

We have some really exciting guests lined up, have some really great conversations planned. So go ahead and get your tickets. You can find those over at bloomberg.com/oddlots, or click the link below in the show notes and come and say hi when you're there.

SPEAKER_3 (0:49)

Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio, news.

Tracy Alloway (1:05)

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots podcast. I'm Tracy Alloway.

Joe Weisenthal (1:09)

And I'm Joe Weisenthal.

Tracy Alloway (1:10)

Joe, we did an episode recently with Reed Luestelow, the chief marketing officer over at the Truck Parking Club. And that was a great episode about the- Superfund. The rebound in trucking.

But he mentioned one thing and he did it in a sort of offhand way and it really piqued my interest. He basically said that cargo theft had become this huge deal. And it wasn't just some guys stealing boxes off the back of trucks, which is kind of what I have in my head.

Joe Weisenthal (1:38)

Same.

Tracy Alloway (1:38)

It was people spoofing actual carriers or pretending to be a carrier and then picking up entire cargo loads of inventory and presumably reselling it.

Joe Weisenthal (1:49)

No, that totally blew my mind. I mean, it makes sense, right? Like, OK, if we're talking in the US, there's tens of thousands of trucking companies. And so the degree to which any shipper could really know any carriers, it's probably kind of loose, et cetera. It's like, yeah, why not just sort of like spring up one day and, you know, get some shipments and then take them on your own way. It makes a lot of sense, but definitely not what I would have had in mind, as you said, about what a cargo theft meant up until that point.

Tracy Alloway (2:16)

Well, since then, I keep seeing these headlines popping up. There was a great Bloomberg story the other day actually called The Great Modern Train Robbery Thieves Steal 200 million a year off of railway cars. And so you can see, this seems to be a big deal.

We know living in New York that it feels like shoplifting has become a bigger deal in recent years after the pandemic. And we can debate whether or not the statistics bear that out. But certainly, if you walk down the street and you go into our local Duane Reed, everything's locked up, right?

Joe Weisenthal (2:48)

Right. That's the sort of core thing is I don't, you know, there's probably various ways to massage statistics and all kinds of stuff. But whatever, it's not good.

Tracy Alloway (2:59)

I see them locking the stuff up.

Joe Weisenthal (3:00)

They're locking it up. They must know that customers by and large hate it, right? They must know that it decreases labor productivity, having to have staffers in the store.

Tracy Alloway (3:10)

You have to ring the bell and wave.

Joe Weisenthal (3:11)

Yeah, get a deodorant and so on. They can't think that that's a great operation. So if they're doing it, I presume there are some real issues there.

Tracy Alloway (3:18)

Well, we're going to get into all of it today. We'll do the low-level locking stuff up on shelves, all the way to the high level, pretending to be an entire trucking company and stealing someone's inventory that way. And I'm glad to say, we have the perfect guest to try to understand all of this. We're going to be speaking with Scott Glenn. He is the vice president of asset protection over at the Home Depot, and an organized retail crime expert. So truly the perfect person to speak to. Scott, thank you so much for coming on Odd Lots.

Scott Glenn (3:48)

Yeah, thanks guys. Thanks for having me. Appreciate the expert designation. I'm not so sure I can live up to that, but I'll do my best.

Tracy Alloway (3:56)

I love that you're wearing the Home Depot apron as well.

Scott Glenn (3:59)

Yeah. Look, it's part of our culture. It's part of what we are. You can see our values over our heart is an intentional thing. Today's earnings day for Home Depot, and so we're all supporting the cause.