At the 2013 Retail Fraud conference in London, Iceland Food’s Head of Loss Prevention Ady Houghton spoke to delegates about how his work with B to B Links Ltd saw profits from leg of lamb soar while dramatically reducing losses.
Shoplifting of Iceland’s frozen legs of lamb had got to the point where managers were losing confidence in merchandising. “We had to make a choice – to find an effective solution to reduce losses or take the product off the shelf entirely,” Houghton explained.
“We went out to three suppliers and were impressed with B2BSG’s innovative approach, which was to use a traditional safer box, modified to accommodate legs of lamb,” he added.
Lamb safer boxes brought significant sales increase with negligible losses
After store trials to test product performance in freezers, merchandising layouts, staff and customer feedback and shrink, Iceland gave the green light to a nationwide roll-out with B2BSG. Lamb safer boxes were introduced to more than 550 stores nationwide alongside a programme of staff training.
The result for Iceland’s bottom line has been impressive.
“We knew from the trials that this solution would work, but the results have really exceeded our expectations. B2BSG’s safer boxes have delivered significant profit growth from this product line at the same time as virtually eliminating losses, and the increase in lamb sales has also delivered stronger results in related lines as well,” Houghton concluded.
“We’re delighted that the project has been such a big success for Iceland,” added Colin Warnock, B2BSG’s Managing Director. “We had to be sure that the product would work in what is obviously a demanding frozen environment. We also needed to bring Iceland colleagues with us and we had to deliver a major roll-out in just a few weeks. Our product development, training and logistics teams delivered on all counts.”
B2BSG’s work with Iceland makes headlines in The Grocer
About B to B Links Ltd
B to B Links has provided innovative security tagging, product protection and CCTV solutions to national retail since 2000. The company offers feature-packed AM, RF and EM security tagging systems, a complete CCTV service from installation to support, and a wide range of innovative product protection solutions, including food safer boxes.
About Iceland Foods
Iceland is a British food retailer with more than 780 stores throughout the UK, franchised stores in several European countries, and a major export business. It employs 24,000 people and was rated The Best Big Company to Work For in the UK in the 2012 Sunday Times Best Companies list. For more information about Iceland, please visit www.iceland.co.uk.