Assorted Afflatuses

I know that if I ran any kind of retail operation I would prefer that my customers not steal the merchandise. As such, I have a great deal of understanding for merchants who make efforts to secure their goods, especially when the measures have almost no impact on the world's law abiding folks. Today, however, a security system not only inconvenienced me, but also raised questions in my mind about the effectiveness of the system in question.

The story begins this very afternoon, when I decided to do a touch of shopping. After successful trips to several stores, I popped into my local neighborhood Nordstrom establishment to buy some socks. Of course, I could not help make an impulse buy: a pair of those fancy-shmancy "Seven" jeans. Nothing particularly unusual. Forty-five minutes after entering, I left the store quite content with my socks and denim in bag.

But, as seems to happen with many of my endeavors, something went wrong. When I pulled the jeans out of the bright red shopping bag and unfolded them, I noticed that the small plastic security device had not been removed at the point-of-sales terminal. I have yet to make the return trip to the store to have it removed, though it really irks me that the salesperson failed to remove the tag.

More so than that, however, this incident makes me wonder why the store bothers to put the tags on the clothes. I walked out of the store and, to the best of my knowledge, no loud alarm sounded. To me, this means that any run-of-the-mill shoplifter could easily have swiped the jeans and waltzed right out of the store. This too also seems like a lose-lose situation for shareholders: the merchandise is no more secure and the system is expensive to implement in maintain.

So, a note to retailers: make it safe or forget about it. And, either way, please tell your employees to remove the blasted security devices!