STEAL’nSAVE: Experts share their ethos on stealing from supermarkets
DISCLAIMER: Massive does not condone or encourage stealing from supermarkets.
Supermarkets were once a place where you could snack on grapes in your cart, buy two blocks of butter for under $10, and get shopping bags for free.
But today, any sense of nostalgia vanishes in the harsh fluorescent aisles of duopoly supermarkets, where prices are sky-high and 360 cameras watch you from every corner.
Some people have resorted to stealing from supermarket chains in an act of rebellion — or perhaps, an act of survival.
One thief, Checkout Cheat*, has been perfecting his craft for the past seven years — now stealing groceries once or twice a week. He's made a sucker of supermarkets, “I’ve had self-check-out clerks come help me while I’m stealing, and they’re not aware what’s in the bag.”
New Zealand's supermarket sector is dominated by two companies: Foodstuffs (New World, Pak'nSave, and Four Square) and Woolworths (Countdown, SuperValue, and FreshChoice). This duopoly stifles market competition, allowing these companies to charge high prices without losing customers.
Checkout Cheat says he’s “sickened” by the supermarket duopoly.
In the past year, supermarket food prices have been up 3.5%, according to Stats NZ. Dairy has seen the steepest increases, with milk up 16% and butter a staggering 64%.
Cheakout Cheat's pilfering journey began after a climate strike protest in 2018, where he saw a sign that read: ‘Woolworths is a climate criminal.’
“It kind of gave me a green light,” he says. In a revolt, he started stealing items out of his price range, like olive oil, meat and cheese.
But with increasing security across supermarkets, he's had to evolve his technique.
A report from Foodstuffs revealed theft in co-op supermarkets has doubled in the past two years. In response, supermarkets are investing heavily in surveillance technology. Foodstuffs have trailed facial recognition in 25 New World and Pak'nSave stores to help identify repeat offenders.
Meanwhile, Woolworths has invested $45 million into a three-year plan, adding security measures like safety cameras, trolley lock systems, fog cannons, double-entry gates and anti-sweep shelving.
In spite of this, Checkout Cheat uses a technique he calls the “trojan horse style swipe”. He scans some of the items he’s paying for while hiding the rest at the bottom of his bag. As he exits, he hides the stolen goods under larger paid items like frozen pizzas and bags of chips.
He says older methods, like the ‘onion scam’ where people would scan anything in a brown paper bag as an onion, don't tend to work anymore.
He's learnt these rules the hard way, as he got caught last year by a secret shopper — an employee posing as a customer — after not paying for coffee at the self-checkouts.
“I gave a bullshit story and ended up paying for the coffee that I had stolen. But I got away with the ice cream, meat and olive oil because they didn’t look in my bag.”
This near miss hasn’t impacted his swiping, as he says secret shoppers mainly catch people paying for the wrong product.
Checkout Cheat criticises supermarkets for low wages, saying they are more willing to spend money on security than on properly paying their workers.
He says security guards are employed because of the work that he does.
However, he believed one of the reasons he may have gotten away with this for so long is his skin colour. "I know as a pakeha person that my skin tone puts me under the radar a bit."
Another thief, Produce Poacher*, began shoplifting at age 11 in Kmart. But what started as a rebellious activity, became a means of survival after moving out of home at 15.
Produce Poacher's go-to method involves slipping items into their pockets or sleeves. They stress they never steal from places where it directly impacts employees.
“In big supermarket chains no one’s salary or hourly wage is getting cut because customers are stealing.”
In an effort to not impact the employees, Produce Poacher advises that those who do get caught to not be a dick to workers. According to FoodSafe, violent and aggressive offences against supermarket staff has doubled in the past two years.
“If an employee getting paid minimum wage catches you stealing and you’re an asshole about it, that’s not on.”
“They are just catching you because it’s their job, just take it on the chin.”
Really, the financial situation of those minimum wage workers may not be so different to the thieves they catch. We are all reacting to rising costs in different ways, and while we're taught stealing is wrong, it’s worth considering:
Are thieves at fault, or are duopoly supermarket prices just too high?
*Names changed for anonymity