From The Show Floor: NRF LP 2014
By Erin Harris, Editor-In-Chief, Cell & Gene
Follow Me On Twitter @ErinHarris_1
Fort Lauderdale is the place to be if you’re involved with loss prevention and asset protection in the retail industry. NRF LP Conference and Expo is underway; the show formally began on Tuesday and winds down on Friday. As I walked the show floor yesterday, I had the opportunity to talk to several retailers and solutions providers about what’s next in loss prevention. In case you missed it, here are some of yesterday’s top take-aways as well as overarching themes from the entire event.
- Mobility, Mobility, Mobility
As mobility continues to dominate the retail conversation, loss prevention and asset protection professionals are in search of ways to reduce malicious shrink and operational shrink. As mobile POS adoption increases, LP executives are assessing risk associated with operational inefficiencies.
- Better Inventory Control
Loss prevention solutions have come a long way. These solutions still help retailers catch bad guys and reduce shrink, but some LP technologies including video analytics and RFID also offer valuable data that helps improve inventory visibility. To help achieve their planned inventory goals, some retailers are adopting Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) to gain greater visibility into the location and status of merchandise throughout their supply chains and in their stores.
- LP In An Omni-Channel World
There are many loss prevention challenges associated with operating in an omni-channel environment (e.g. inventory and returns management, fraud modeling, exception reporting, systems integration, etc.). Bridging the gap between human capital and LP best practices needs to involve solutions spending conversations that include the various stake holders throughout the enterprise.
- LP: It’s Not Just About Catching Bad Guys
I had a great conversation with Dr. Read Hayes, director of Loss Prevention Research Council (LPRC) about the future of loss prevention in retail. “LP is not one line item among many on a retail checklist,” he explains. “LP is core to the entire enterprise.”
Indeed, LP’s vital and extensive role in the retail enterprise was today’s common theme. The LP team has access to data and analytics that benefits the entire organization from safety and compliance to employee training to traffic counting to dwell time to inventory control. Technology provides better intelligence and visibility, so you can improve the customer experience and the bottom line.
What else have you learned at NRF LP? What are some of the things you’re hoping to learn or gain a better understanding of while you’re here? Email me to let me know.