On November 1, TAG Company will finalise the installation of Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS) across the UK Woolworths estate
The firms describe it as a milestone in the five-year exclusive agreement between the two companies. Over the past 18 months, the companies have worked together to provide fully integrated retail tagging to all 821 stores across the UK, protecting the high street retailer’s range of merchandise from potential shoplifters.
In addition to the 20,000 EAS elements installed, 8,000 sensors and data logging units will wirelessly collect, collate and transmit information around each store, providing the retailer with information such as customer counting and alarm frequency. This is the largest programme of its kind in the UK, the firms claim.
Woolworths now joins the majority of the UK’s High Street retailers in deploying EAS as a tool to improve on-shelf availability and operational efficiencies by reducing theft. Also,TAG is managing Woolworths’ source tagging programme, whereby security labels are applied at the point of manufacture or distribution. This involves the management of more than 500 global suppliers, representing 6,000 product lines.
What they say
Phil Doyle, Managing Director of TAG said: "We have reached the end of the first phase of this programme. All 821 stores are now protected with electronic tagging systems; which directly supports Woolworths’ business goals. We are also well underway with the next phase of the programme, which is the incorporation of security protection directly into Woolworths’ merchandise at point of supply around the world. Most merchandise within store is now tagged either discreetly, inside packaging, or with a clear ‘Security Protected’ tag."
Matt Jackson, Head of Stores for Woolworths, shared his thoughts on the program with colleagues at the recent European Retail Crime conference in London (see December print issue of Professional Security). In his presentation, Jackson emphasized the need to satisfy the requirements of a wide range of stakeholders in such an important programme; EAS has moved on from being simply a Loss Prevention tool to one which needs to be embraced by all elements of retail in order to deliver real-world business benefits. Under the five-year exclusive agreement, TAG provides full maintenance, training and ongoing support for the use of the EAS systems across Woolworths’ 821 stores, and works closely with Woolworths’ Risk and Operations teams to combat shoplifting and drive profit across the full range of merchandise.
