For years, stores in Southern California have kept expensive items locked away to deter thieves.
Rite Aid, on the corner of Long Beach and Compton boulevards, takes this approach to safety to a new extreme. There, customers are greeted by rows of items stacked on shelves — makeup, chips, baby formula, paper towels, lotion and juice — enclosed behind plexiglass.
Most items in the store are available only with the click of a button, causing an employee to come in, open a case, and remove the item the customer is interested in (and put it back if interest wanes).
The store’s move has left the community divided, and employees are speaking out about how disruptive the change has been to their work day.
At 8:30 a.m. on Thursday, Compton native Kimiko Jones, 43, said she reluctantly went to this Rite Aid location because she needed cough medicine for a family member. Jones said she prefers to go to other locations in neighboring cities — where she can pick items off the shelves herself — but it was early enough on Thursday that she knew she wouldn’t have to wait long for assistance.
“It’s frustrating because if people in the community didn’t come in here vandalizing or come in with their big bags to pick up stuff, we wouldn’t have to go through all of this,” Jones said.
It’s unclear when the store put all of its inventory behind locks and if other Rite Aid stores will do the same.
“Like many others in the industry, we are seeing a high level of blatant shoplifting and organized retail crime,” the company said in a statement. “We are playing an active role in assisting law enforcement in the search for shoplifters, as well as continuing our efforts to educate community leaders about the impact of retail theft and advocate for solutions.”
The statement further said that the company is “implementing multi-layered product security solutions that are regularly evaluated.”
Rite Aid has closed hundreds of stores in California after it filed a lawsuit against the US government. Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023 as companies struggle To deal with creditors and lawsuits over opioid prescriptions.
In 2022, The National Retail Federation recognized Los Angeles as The city has the worst problem with organized retail crime in the country, ahead of the San Francisco/Oakland area, New York City, and Houston.
Last month, Governor Gavin Newsom signed a package of bills Making it easier for the police to arrest shoplifters and dismantling large retail crime gangs to stop the rise in organised retail theft.
Jones said thefts increased so much at the Compton Rite Aid whenever some people came in, that most of the shelves were empty.
Pharmacy technician Julissa Blackburn said it’s been a stressful shift.
Blackburn said since the products were discontinued, fewer customers have been coming in. And those who do come to the location are complaining about the change and the wait time that comes with it.
“It’s very tiring,” Blackburn said. “At the end of the day my legs hurt and I’m so stressed, I get a lot of headaches.”
He said there are usually two to three employees in a store and about six in a pharmacy, which isn’t enough.
“Just have a little more patience with us and try to understand that we’re trying to do as much as we can for everybody here,” Blackburn said.
Mauro Villalba, 60, welcomed the store’s new policy, as he said he has seen people steal at this Rite Aid location, and cashiers can’t do anything about it.
He said putting more items behind plexiglass was a logical next step for the pharmacy, as he’s seen many other stores in the area start locking up their products.
Pharmacy technician Cynthia Ayala, who has worked at another Rite Aid location for 15 years, said the company may claim to be more secure with the new closed-end items, but “it’s frustrating because if somebody wants to steal, you can still be pushed off and it becomes an unsafe situation.”
He said employees were already feeling stressed about being unable to stop shoplifters and hearing customer complaints despite empty shelves. The new security measures are just another layer of stress, he said.
“If you have a customer waiting for 15 or 20 minutes, by the time we get there he or she is going to be annoyed and the customer experience is gone,” Ayala said.
Ayala and Blackburn are members of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 770which is currently negotiating with Rite Aid over wages, hours and benefits.
Eva Guzman, 76, was brought to the Rite Aid pharmacy to get vaccinated by her daughter, Eva Martinez, 54. Gomez said she first heard about the store’s change in the news.
She said it was shocking to see this happen at her community Rite Aid, where she often goes for medication, food and other items, “all because of the criminal behavior that goes on here.”
