Insight Session
From “Frictionless” to “Friction Efficient”: Using Problem Analysis to Guide Smarter Security and Sales Strategies
San Diego Convention Center
From “Frictionless” to “Friction Efficient”: Using Problem Analysis to Guide Smarter Security and Sales Strategies
In the face of rising retail theft and operational pressures, retailers are seeking innovative strategies to balance loss prevention with seamless customer experiences. In this session, Dr. Cory Lowe of the Loss Prevention Research Council (LPRC) will challenge the popular but impractical ideal of “frictionless retail” and introduce a more grounded, impactful approach – “friction efficient” retail.
Drawing on extensive research and field experience, Dr. Lowe will walk attendees through a practical problem analysis framework that helps retailers make more informed and effective decisions about security and service interventions. This includes:
- Merchandise Assessment: How the nature, form factor, and theft risk of high-loss items should directly influence protective measures.
- Customer and Offender Profiling: Why understanding the behaviors and needs of both legitimate shoppers and potential offenders—opportunistic or organized—is critical for selecting and tailoring effective loss prevention strategies.
- Strategic Use of Friction: How to implement retail friction deliberately and efficiently—leveraging it when necessary to deter crime, minimize disruption for loyal customers, and even create new marketing and sales opportunities.
Dr. Lowe will also introduce key concepts such as leveraged friction, targeted friction, and friction shift, and show how retail leaders can use these to simultaneously drive profitability and improve safety. Grounded in rational choice theory and situational crime prevention, this session will equip attendees with the tools to turn inevitable friction into a strategic asset.
