Pedro Ramos and Evolution of Loss Prevention

I thought I’d share with you all a conversation I recently had with Pedro Ramos, director of retail solutions at Agilence. Pedro emigrated from Portugal at the age of 11 with his parents to seek economic opportunities in the U.S. and went on to form over two decades of experience in retail after college. Pedro previously served as the assistant vice president for loss prevention at Pathmark Stores Inc. (since acquired by A&P) and today manages Agilence’s retail solutions focused on reducing profit margin loss for America’s retailers—that is, when he’s not busy running his son and daughters’ soccer leagues and coaching their games.

I spoke with Pedro recently to learn more about his background and the lessons he has brought to Agilence. We touch upon several topics that are also covered in our recent white paper on hidden operational shrink.

DR: So Pedro, I know that you have a long history in retail. Tell us then, what was the grocery industry like in the dark ages?
PR: (laughs) Well, if you consider the early 90’s the dark ages—and in some ways I suppose it was—I’d have to say that the loss prevention industry was nothing like it is today. This is mainly because the technology at that time was in its nascent stages. Grocers were still focused on detection and apprehension of criminal activity. There were few if any financial audit programs and people were still relying on paper and checklists. … Continue Reading

The Cloud is the Future for Retail

On May 11, 2011, RetailWire posted a BrainTrust Query entitled, The Napster Moment. 

The discussion was titled such because it refers to the effect Napster had on the recording industry.  Napster, for better or worse (better, I say) forever changed how consumers receive their music.  It should have been a moment of enlightenment for the recording industry.  Consumers said that we would no longer accept having to buy the whole album (complete with b-sides and tracks that should have remained on the cutting room floor).  We wanted to buy just the song we wanted.  And, we wanted to do it over the web.  Whiel teh recording industry could have grabbed the bull by the horns, they didn’t.  They fought the trend and have lost greatly because of it.  Apple finally made them capitulate and they were forced to do it on Apple’s terms.  If they had just embraced the Napster moment, they could maintained control of the distribution model and had their own iTunes stores. … Continue Reading

Wrap-Up from NRF Loss Prevention Conference 2010

The NRF Loss Prevention Conference is officially over and it was a big success!  This was the largest LP conference ever!  There were over 1000 attendees this year and it was easy to see.

We demonstrated Hawkeye 4.0, complete with our new advanced POS Video Auditing capabilities for Automatic Sweetheart Detection and Refund Fraud.  For the demo, we enlisted the help of both IBM (for their POS) and Cisco (for their cameras) and we brought a full grocery check stand to the event.  We actually ran transactions and then demonstrated how Hawkeye synchronizes the data and video in real-time and how that information can be easily searched to identify losses at the point-of-sale. … Continue Reading

Video from Agilence at NRF Loss Prevention Conference

Derek Rodner, VP of Product Strategy for Agilence, talks about the joint demonstration of Agilence, IBM and Cisco at the 2010 NRF Loss Prevention Conference.

Booth Set-up at 2010 NRF Loss Prevention Conference

Are you excited for NRF LP?  We are!  Of course, nothing is easy.  Turns out the set-up crew (not the folks in the video clip) set the booth up facing the wrong way!  And by the time we got there, it was too late to fix it.  Someone will pay!!!!  Oh well, enjoy this sneak peak at the set-up.  Tomorrow we will be setting up the actual demos and the full check stand!