Less loyalty, more shrink.

Forty-six percent of our survey respondents this month agreed they are "going to more different types of food stores than they used to." As they shop in different types of stores, they become aware of more types of checkouts and more kinds of security checks. Most consumers still shop at stores that use traditional shopping carts that they unload onto the checkout lane. Checkers are supposed to check these shopping carts for items that don't make it onto the counter, but few checkers check the carts all the time and many never check them at all.

The exit-staffers at Wal-Mart, Target and Home Depot make up for what their checkers don't check by looking at the inside of carts and marking sales slips as consumers are leaving the store. These cart checkers pay for themselves in reduced shrink, just by making sure that unbagged (and unpurchased) items aren't being walked out of the store along with the items that have been paid for.

Some shoppers who are familiar with traditional carts in which they put their purchases onto the counter suddenly "get" the less-shrink reasoning for checker unloading. One shopper who was impressed with the checkouts at Trader Joe's told us that "Trader Joe's have lower prices because customers pay for everything they buy there--not like the supermarket where lots of people leave one or two items in the cart and never pay for them."

I doubt that security cameras are much of a deterrent to shoppers who realize that supermarkets are the one kind of store in which no one is really checking the shopping cart to make sure they've paid for everything in it.