https://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/ ... 3720509798
You may also see another version of this story in your news feeds from Google from TV Channel 6, "KOIN," that is a bit more sensational and less helpful to the overall discussion.
Fred Meyer President Todd Kammeyer says the company has suffered record levels of thefts and loss in the past 12 months.
SamSpade wrote: ↑June 30th, 2023, 12:29 amhttps://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/ ... 3720509798
You may also see another version of this story in your news feeds from Google from TV Channel 6, "KOIN," that is a bit more sensational and less helpful to the overall discussion.
Fred Meyer President Todd Kammeyer says the company has suffered record levels of thefts and loss in the past 12 months.
You know the reason why. Plastic bags are only given out at checkout and are a way to not only carry groceries, but also indicating that those groceries have been paid for. With reusable bags, they don't know what's paid for or not, and combined with some other factors, stores are seeing their shrink levels go through the roof.
Portland did a plastic bag ban many years ago but did not have a paper bag fee. So paper bags were given free. Then the State of Oregon's Sustainable Shopping Act attached a 5 cent fee to bags effective 2020 but it wasn't implemented then due to COVID.
Around May 2021 the city of Portland started to demand stores follow the state law so the bag fee started to be assessed in Portland stores.
Fred Meyer in Portland for years had signs at the exits stating to show receipt for unbagged merchandise upon request. However this was not imposed on all shoppers, only those with unbagged merchandise.
So now since there is evidently so much unbagged merchandise plus the reusable bags being used for significant theft the policy will be to bag check all shoppers.
Ultimately these bag bans will end up being reversed due to all of the issues they cause with theft.
At least the Fred Meyer President says they want to keep the stores open... reading between the lines, if things do not improve, we will see what happens in another year.
pseudo3d wrote: ↑June 30th, 2023, 8:00 am
You know the reason why. Plastic bags are only given out at checkout and are a way to not only carry groceries, but also indicating that those groceries have been paid for. With reusable bags, they don't know what's paid for or not, and combined with some other factors, stores are seeing their shrink levels go through the roof.
Of course they can know what is paid for and what is not - if someone has walked to/through the door with a reusable bag and was NOT COMING FROM THE DIRECTION OF THE CHECKOUT COUNTERS - they are the ones to stop and check, since it's not likely they paid. If they happened to have done so (say they checked out and went back to see an item they thought rang up incorrectly), they show the receipt, and all is good - nothing requires any store to check every receipt. No receipt - then they are in trouble.
Someone may have failed to scan an item or two in other settings, but those are a small quantity compared to someone with a bag (or more) full of stuff - catch those big ones and it will lower the numbers dramatically.
Legally, under Oregon law they can't force you to show a receipt. This is entirely voluntary. They just will not admit it.
Fred Meyer's problem is their store layout leads to increased shoplifting. Back in the 80's they had metal gates and limited ways of getting in and out of department. Now many stores have cash registers nowhere near the doors. Incredibly tempting to just walk out where there are no eyes on the doors. Plus they have very little staff working on the floor. It looks like they will be addressing some of these issues but they created their own beast by designing a bit too friendly of a shopping experience.
pseudo3d wrote: ↑June 30th, 2023, 8:00 am
You know the reason why. Plastic bags are only given out at checkout and are a way to not only carry groceries, but also indicating that those groceries have been paid for. With reusable bags, they don't know what's paid for or not, and combined with some other factors, stores are seeing their shrink levels go through the roof.
Of course they can know what is paid for and what is not - if someone has walked to/through the door with a reusable bag and was NOT COMING FROM THE DIRECTION OF THE CHECKOUT COUNTERS - they are the ones to stop and check, since it's not likely they paid. If they happened to have done so (say they checked out and went back to see an item they thought rang up incorrectly), they show the receipt, and all is good - nothing requires any store to check every receipt. No receipt - then they are in trouble.
Someone may have failed to scan an item or two in other settings, but those are a small quantity compared to someone with a bag (or more) full of stuff - catch those big ones and it will lower the numbers dramatically.
Fred Meyer Stores are not laid out like a standard store. They are more like a little mall almost. Many have what you'd call the "mall corridor" in an L-shape. They have checkouts at 4 key places in the store: grocery, apparel, hardlines, and electronics; none of these registers are visible from one another and in most cases aren't really visible from the doors either. There isn't just one bank of checkouts. The person standing at the door has no way to see if the person coming to the door went through checkout or not in most of these stores due to their layout.
They also have multiple checkouts that are nowhere near the doors. For example none of the grocery checkouts are within view of the doors of electronics/apparel at most Fred Meyer stores, they are literally 200 footsteps away and around a corner.
babs wrote: ↑June 30th, 2023, 11:30 am
Legally, under Oregon law they can't force you to show a receipt. This is entirely voluntary. They just will not admit it.
Fred Meyer's problem is their store layout leads to increased shoplifting. Back in the 80's they had metal gates and limited ways of getting in and out of department. Now many stores have cash registers nowhere near the doors. Incredibly tempting to just walk out where there are no eyes on the doors. Plus they have very little staff working on the floor. It looks like they will be addressing some of these issues but they created their own beast by designing a bit too friendly of a shopping experience.
I won't wait in any lines to show a receipt unless I'm at Costco or Sam's where I agreed to it...
But at Fred Meyer in Portland if I bypass any line wanting me to show a receipt, will this get me tackled out on the front sidewalk by third party security?
storewanderer wrote: ↑June 30th, 2023, 1:06 pm
But at Fred Meyer in Portland if I bypass any line wanting me to show a receipt, will this get me tackled out on the front sidewalk by third party security?
If they do, you'll have a nice payday! There would be no shortage of lawyers lining up to help.
No, the bag bans are not going to be reversed because of theft. Even if they were reversed, people could still bring reusable bags. Ultimately, theft is the store's responsibility to address, not the government's.
While a store cannot legally compel you to show a receipt upon exit, they can ban you from the premises if you don't comply. This is true whether or not there is a membership involved. Violating the ban can then get you arrested.
