The Rise of Organized Retail Crime at Big Box Stores

September 10, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

When Scott Glenn joined Home Depot in 2018, he wasn't even sure organized retail crime was real. "I wasn't really a big believer in what you would call the organized retail crime problem," he says. Seven years later, he describes a world where cartels, transnational gangs, and sophisticated criminal networks treat retail theft as a lucrative, industrial-scale operation. As Home Depot's vice president of asset protection, Glenn now oversees the defense of 2,400 stores against a threat that ranges from a single stolen power drill to fake trucking companies driving away with entire cargo loads.

The Spectrum of Theft, From Need to Cartel

Retail theft isn't one problem. Glenn breaks it into three categories. First, there's "operational" shrink—the 30% of inventory loss that retailers cause themselves through administrative errors, miscounts, or poor processes. Then there's "malicious" shrink, which divides further. About 40% of malicious loss comes from employees stealing from their own company. The remaining chunk comes from external actors, and within that group, Glenn distinguishes between "need" shoplifters and professional criminals.

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What you'll learn

1 (02:34) **Introducing the Scale of Retail Theft** - Hosts Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal frame the episode around cargo theft, locked-up shelves, and organized crime, setting up the interview with Scott Glenn, VP of Asset Protection at Home Depot.
2 (05:12) **Scott’s Background and the Most Stolen Items** - Scott shares his career path from law school and the Treasury Department to retail asset protection, and reveals what thieves target most at Home Depot.
3 (08:13) **Defining Retail Theft: A Spectrum from Need to Cartel** - Scott categorizes retail theft from low-level opportunistic shoplifting to sophisticated, cartel-linked organized crime.
4 (09:49) **What is “Shrinkage”?** - Scott explains the retail accounting term “shrink” and how Home Depot breaks it down.
5 (11:43) **Is Retail Theft Actually Getting Worse?** - Scott gives a nuanced answer on whether the problem is growing, noting that he himself was a skeptic until recently.
6 (17:08) **How to Spot an Organized Theft Ring** - Scott details the investigative process of distinguishing a one-time shoplifter from a professional booster working for a ring.
7 (21:06) **Myth: Retailers Let Thieves Steal Up to a Threshold** - Scott clarifies that Home Depot does not allow theft to build up charges; instead, they may let a suspect leave to follow them to the fence or storage location.

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Show Notes

If you walk into a local pharmacy in New York City, more likely than not, lots of the merchandise is locked behind closed doors as a measure to mitigate shoplifting. So how big is the “retail shrink” problem really? And why are stores willing to sacrifice customer experience to protect their inventory? According to today’s guest, the Home Depot’s VP of Asset Protection Scott Glenn, shoplifting is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to retail theft. What is really bedeviling companies like the Home Depot is something called organized retail crime — heists by criminal outfits that seek to nab large quantities of merchandise that eventually ends up in the black market. Today, we speak with Glenn about the in-and-outs of organized retail crime, the retail shrink problem, and what stores are doing to bring down theft right now.

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