Overview
- A social media image and press reports show Co-op stores placing locked plastic boxes fitted with GPS tags around meat items, including a £3.90 pack of sausages and higher-value steaks and roasts.
- Co-op says the GPS units track a boxed product’s location if it is removed without payment and can only be disengaged when the item is legitimately bought at the till.
- The chain attributes the technology alongside CCTV, body-worn cameras, fortified kiosks and extra guarding to a fall in its retail crime, with the company reporting double-digit drops in theft, abuse and assaults.
- Retail groups and statistics show the scale of the problem driving these steps: the British Retail Consortium recorded about 5.5 million detected theft incidents last year that cost shops nearly £400 million, and prosecutions for shoplifting have risen.
- The move follows a legal change that removed the £200 threshold for summary-only treatment of shoplifting, expanding prosecutorial options, and other supermarkets say they use locked cases for high-value items though some decline to confirm use of GPS tracking.