Jewellers should take heed and shame shop criminals

I am in the midst of writing a retail report for Retail Jeweller magazine on crime at jewellers. Funnily enough, this was commissioned before the big heist at Graff, which has only deemed to make it even more topical.

I've heard a lot of horror stories this week, and while the general consensus is that if robbers want to break into your shop, smash cabinets and escape with all your stock, there's not a lot you can do to prevent them. The challenge is in fact catching the criminals after the fact.

I was speaking to a friend of mine at Retail Week magazine about this and she was covering a crime story about discunt retaler TJ Morris. The retailer is often targeted by shoplifters and in an attempt to get justice, TJ Morris publihes pictures of the shoplifters on its website with descriptions of the crime and which store it took place at. Above the images, it has an online form that informants can fill with information on the shoplifters and if it leads to a conviction, they can claim a reward of up to £1,000.

Pawnbroker and jewellery retailer Herbert Brown is one of the retailers that will be included in my report, and managing director Rod Mason told me that when one of its stores was robbed by armed men, they were caught after the local paper published images (see above) of the roberry on its front page.

Seems as though shaming, if not naming, criminals can lead to justice.

To read my retail report on jewellery shop crime, see the September issue of Retail Jeweller