I caught a shoplifter red-handed at my local Tesco’s this morning.

I was going around the aisles, minding my own business, whistling the theme tune to Fame, when in the last aisle with all the soft drinks etc., I saw a man crouched down stuffing bottles of lemonade into a big hold-all. He didn’t take just one or two, he took at least a dozen bottles. We’re talking the big two litre bottles here. The case was obviously empty and the guy was on a mission.

Now the guy hadn’t seen me, as I had come up behind him and he was watching the other direction. I have to admit I stood there for a minute, gobsmacked at what I was seeing, my mind registering the fact that he was stealing bottles of lemonade.

So I gathered my thoughts together and went to find a shop person to let them know about it. I found a lady who I recognised as a till supervisor and told her what I’d seen and gave her a description of what he was wearing.

I tell you what, this guy had some balls. In the meantime, he had a shopping basket in one hand whilst wheeling around the hold-all on wheels, taking his sweet time. He even stop to ask another member of staff where some other either item was.
By this time I was at the till unloading my groceries and he was at one of the 10 items or less tills. In the interim the supervisor had told the security guard about the guy and what to look out for.

As the shoplifter took so long with his other items at the 10 items or less checkout, I was done paying for my goods and on my way to the lift heading to the car park, so I never got to see what happened and I thought it would’ve been a bit weird standing around waiting to see what would happen. I’ll have to ask the supervisor when I’m next in.

The funny thing was, when I was in last week I was just chatting to one of the cashiers at the till who was telling me that since the recession there was a huge increase in shoplifting, to the point where they had to put toiletries like men’s deodorant and Nurofen in plastic cases so they had to be unlocked at the till. That particular store is losing thousands each month through shoplifting and unfortunately passing the shortfall to raising the prices of goods. I was fascinated by the stories the cashier was telling me and I thought it might be good for one of my assignments, should it ever come up.

I mean with this guy, it wasn’t just one or two, as I said it was at least a dozen he stuffed his case with. Maybe it was for his restaurant, or maybe he just had a prediliction for shop brand lemonade, I don’t know. But you could tell he’d done it before. And instead of walking out immediately, he spent at least another 10mins or so, wandering around the store wheeling around the stolen lemonade in his hold-all. Talk about Mr. Super-Cool.
Human nature, fascinating.