5 ms·

The “data” in question is reported theft, but the article completely ignores the possibility that theft goes unreported in these areas because the population is

The “data” in question is reported theft, but the article completely ignores the possibility that theft goes unreported in these areas because the population is aware that reporting the theft will do nothing. It’s hard to take the article seriously when it doesn’t even acknowledge this possible flaw in their data. The other data point mentioned is “shrink”, which isn’t up much. As far as I can tell, this number is a kind of national average, so I don’t see how it has any bearing on stores which were closed because they are outliers.

devmor 3y ago
On what basis do you make the assumption that a multinational retailer, specifically one with some of the most aggressive loss prevention policies in the first world, would not keep track of theft in some stores?
- rascul 3y ago
  I don't think they're making that assumption. I think they're saying that not all theft is reported to the police.
  - devmor 3y ago
    That's the same assumption. Why would Target not report theft as a matter of course?
    - rascul 3y ago
      It's not the same assumption. Target might not know theft has occurred at the time. It will show up later when doing inventory as a discrepancy and be recorded as shrinkage. Target in such a case has nothing to report to the police. There may also be reasons not to report known cases of theft. Lack of evidence, uncooperative police and/or prosecutor, or small enough value so that the effort isn't worth it, for example.
      - devmor 3y ago
        The same assumption applies to all Target locations. There’s no reason for these locations to be any more underreported. And again, Target has one of the most aggressive loss prevention departments in the entire first world.
dghlsakjg 3y ago
From the article: > While crime data doesn't capture all incidents of theft, as some go unreported, it does provide a reliable way to measure relative levels of theft among stores.
JKCalhoun 3y ago
Is there any reason to believe that the degree of unreported theft in one store is any different than unreported theft at another? If unreported theft is similar across stores then it would seem to be essentially noise in the statistics. It's odd that by closing their brick and mortar stores they're essentially rolling up their business and conceding Amazon all those customers.
- bradleyjg 3y ago
  Why is it odd? The goal isn’t revenue, it’s profit. That may have been forgotten during central banks’ long experiment with zirp but we are no longer in that.
  - JKCalhoun 3y ago
    From where I've been sitting, big box retailers have been running on the zeal of expansionism for decades now. No profit? Then by all means they can sit back and let Dollar General come in and capture the retail of a town. In the past this has generally been bad news for an entrenched retailer and the first signs of fracturing. It's hard for me to care too much though what happens to these big chains.
    - bradleyjg 3y ago
      I think you are mixing up cause and effect. It might be a bad sign for a retailer if it has unprofitable stores, but that doesn’t mean keeping them open is going to help.
- prpl 3y ago
  Are you asking if shrink varies store to store? Yes. I grew up in a grocery store basically, shrink could vary 30% or more between stores. Stores with liquor in the back corners could easily be 10% more. Theft is only reported if you caught somebody, which you basically don’t try to do anymore
  - JKCalhoun 3y ago
brookst 3y ago
You raise some good points about the data and analysis here, but it seems curious you’re willing to accept Target’s claims without any data or analysis at all. Certainly retail theft is a big problem, and Target is strongly incentivized to put pressure on government to do something. So I would expect them to blame theft for any store closure, even if was for orthogonal reasons like low sales, problems with building systems, demographic trends, whatever.
- panarky 3y ago
  The Seattle Times compared stores closing with stores remaining open and found that (1) the stores closing had fewer calls to the police than the stores remaining open, and (2) the stores closing just happen to be Target's new smaller-format stores, which have been seriously underperforming nationally. Retail "shrink" includes inventory losses from all causes -- breakage, spoilage, customer theft, employee theft, paperwork theft from fake invoices and receiving errors, and even unknown causes. It's the difference between the inventory they pay for, and the inventory they sell and physically count. Total shrink as a percentage of sales hasn't changed much over the years, so a skeptical mind might wonder why there's suddenly this coordinated, nationwide, nonstop, pervasive hyperventilating over retail theft. A skeptical mind might wonder if there's a hidden agenda driving this messaging.
  - daft_pink 3y ago
    Total shrink data in the article was taken from national average not specific stores. There is no specific shrink data from these stores, so while total shrink on a national level hasn't changed much in years, they have no evidence that total shrink at these specific stores has or hasn't changed. I'm not really for or against Target. I just feel that the quality of using some tangentially associated data while interesting really isn't enough to make assertions that "the data tells a different story" or that Target is covering up internal problems. It's bad journalism to just do some analysis on some data you happen to have and then claim someone who has the data's assertion is totally false. Other potential obvious flaws in methodology: 1. Analyzing the quantity of reported theft calls probably only means thefts where the police were able to make an arrest. Not th 2. Different thefts might result in different dollar amounts and quantity of thefts is probably less important to target than total value of theft. 3. Smaller stores may experience less quantity or value of theft, but have higher levels of overall theft, because they are smaller and have less sales and less traffic.
magicalist 3y ago
> so I don’t see how it has any bearing on stores which were closed because they are outliers. So we have flawed data and a corporate press release with no data and motivation to avoid any conversation about closing stores for any reason that could reflect poorly on the company's fundamentals. (hard to take a comment seriously when it doesn’t even acknowledge this possible flaw in their premise?)

devmor 3y ago

On what basis do you make the assumption that a multinational retailer, specifically one with some of the most aggressive loss prevention policies in the first world, would not keep track of theft in some stores?

rascul 3y ago
I don't think they're making that assumption. I think they're saying that not all theft is reported to the police.
- devmor 3y ago
  That's the same assumption. Why would Target not report theft as a matter of course?
  - rascul 3y ago
    It's not the same assumption. Target might not know theft has occurred at the time. It will show up later when doing inventory as a discrepancy and be recorded as shrinkage. Target in such a case has nothing to report to the police. There may also be reasons not to report known cases of theft. Lack of evidence, uncooperative police and/or prosecutor, or small enough value so that the effort isn't worth it, for example.
    - devmor 3y ago
      The same assumption applies to all Target locations. There’s no reason for these locations to be any more underreported. And again, Target has one of the most aggressive loss prevention departments in the entire first world.

dghlsakjg 3y ago

From the article: > While crime data doesn't capture all incidents of theft, as some go unreported, it does provide a reliable way to measure relative levels of theft among stores.

JKCalhoun 3y ago

Is there any reason to believe that the degree of unreported theft in one store is any different than unreported theft at another? If unreported theft is similar across stores then it would seem to be essentially noise in the statistics. It's odd that by closing their brick and mortar stores they're essentially rolling up their business and conceding Amazon all those customers.

bradleyjg 3y ago
Why is it odd? The goal isn’t revenue, it’s profit. That may have been forgotten during central banks’ long experiment with zirp but we are no longer in that.
- JKCalhoun 3y ago
  From where I've been sitting, big box retailers have been running on the zeal of expansionism for decades now. No profit? Then by all means they can sit back and let Dollar General come in and capture the retail of a town. In the past this has generally been bad news for an entrenched retailer and the first signs of fracturing. It's hard for me to care too much though what happens to these big chains.
  - bradleyjg 3y ago
    I think you are mixing up cause and effect. It might be a bad sign for a retailer if it has unprofitable stores, but that doesn’t mean keeping them open is going to help.
prpl 3y ago
Are you asking if shrink varies store to store? Yes. I grew up in a grocery store basically, shrink could vary 30% or more between stores. Stores with liquor in the back corners could easily be 10% more. Theft is only reported if you caught somebody, which you basically don’t try to do anymore
- JKCalhoun 3y ago

brookst 3y ago

You raise some good points about the data and analysis here, but it seems curious you’re willing to accept Target’s claims without any data or analysis at all. Certainly retail theft is a big problem, and Target is strongly incentivized to put pressure on government to do something. So I would expect them to blame theft for any store closure, even if was for orthogonal reasons like low sales, problems with building systems, demographic trends, whatever.

panarky 3y ago
The Seattle Times compared stores closing with stores remaining open and found that (1) the stores closing had fewer calls to the police than the stores remaining open, and (2) the stores closing just happen to be Target's new smaller-format stores, which have been seriously underperforming nationally. Retail "shrink" includes inventory losses from all causes -- breakage, spoilage, customer theft, employee theft, paperwork theft from fake invoices and receiving errors, and even unknown causes. It's the difference between the inventory they pay for, and the inventory they sell and physically count. Total shrink as a percentage of sales hasn't changed much over the years, so a skeptical mind might wonder why there's suddenly this coordinated, nationwide, nonstop, pervasive hyperventilating over retail theft. A skeptical mind might wonder if there's a hidden agenda driving this messaging.
- daft_pink 3y ago
  Total shrink data in the article was taken from national average not specific stores. There is no specific shrink data from these stores, so while total shrink on a national level hasn't changed much in years, they have no evidence that total shrink at these specific stores has or hasn't changed. I'm not really for or against Target. I just feel that the quality of using some tangentially associated data while interesting really isn't enough to make assertions that "the data tells a different story" or that Target is covering up internal problems. It's bad journalism to just do some analysis on some data you happen to have and then claim someone who has the data's assertion is totally false. Other potential obvious flaws in methodology: 1. Analyzing the quantity of reported theft calls probably only means thefts where the police were able to make an arrest. Not th 2. Different thefts might result in different dollar amounts and quantity of thefts is probably less important to target than total value of theft. 3. Smaller stores may experience less quantity or value of theft, but have higher levels of overall theft, because they are smaller and have less sales and less traffic.

magicalist 3y ago

> so I don’t see how it has any bearing on stores which were closed because they are outliers. So we have flawed data and a corporate press release with no data and motivation to avoid any conversation about closing stores for any reason that could reflect poorly on the company's fundamentals. (hard to take a comment seriously when it doesn’t even acknowledge this possible flaw in their premise?)