Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
Stopping profit leaks and boosting operations at your c-store or gas station is possible, even with the daily grind of shrink. In 2022, retail shrink hit 1.6% of sales, a whopping $112.1 billion nationally. For convenience stores, with sales over $906 billion, that’s tens of millions vanishing daily. It’s not just a cost of doing business, it is a problem that needs to be fixed. Petrosoft’s Loss Prevention Analytics (LPA), powered by Petrosoft AI, and now compatible with a wide range of IP cameras, identifies and stops those profit leaks in real time. It’s really cool, I like learning about AI, it’s such a diverse field, you know there’s so many different applications and it’s constantly evolving which makes it a fascinating area for research and development.
Fix #1: Catch Internal Theft with Transaction + Video Intelligence
Employee theft makes up nearly 29% of shrink. Think about those fake refunds, voids, and suspicious discounts that often slip by unnoticed. LPA directly connects to your POS, using AI to flag unusual activity like frequent voids or strange refunds, and each flagged event is linked to video footage when your camera system is compatible managers get instant context to act. NRF data shows internal theft cases often go over $1,500 each, so catching just one or two a year could bring thousands back to your bottom line, and you’ll spend less time digging through endless footage or reports.
Fix #2: Spot External Theft and Operational Gaps with Smart Discrepancy Detection
External theft, like shoplifting, along with stocking and pricing errors, accounts for a big chunk of shrink. Together, internal and external theft are responsible for 65% of all losses. LPA compares sales data with expected inventory levels, often tracked in tools like C-Store Office, and if items are disappearing without matching sales it flags the discrepancy and allows reviewing the footage tied to that product or timeframe. Whether it’s identifying a recurring shoplifter or uncovering restocking errors, LPA provides the insight to fix costly patterns fast, before they snowball into major losses.
Fix #3: Detect Vendor & Admin Errors with Pattern Recognition
“Paper shrink” from receiving mistakes or invoice mismatches causes over 16% of c-store shrink, and these issues often go undetected in day-to-day operations. LPA reviews historical data to catch recurring patterns, like consistent mismatches between invoices and received quantities or frequent adjustments in specific categories, which supports deeper investigations into vendor issues or internal process gaps. Highlighting trends you’d otherwise miss, LPA stops losses from compounding over time, as short-shipped items or data entry errors, those small inconsistencies add up fast.
Data Meets Video for Real-Time Insight
LPA is like a smart home system for your store: alerts are helpful, but alerts plus video context are powerful. When LPA spots a red flag, you don’t just get data; you get proof. With high camera compatibility and smart AI, LPA gives the full story behind every suspicious event. This is more than just surveillance; it’s a profit protection engine. For a c-store doing $1 million in merchandise sales, cutting shrink by even 0.5% means saving $5,000 per year. Over half of U.S. retailers are increasing their investment in loss prevention tech. Smarter tools like LPA pay for themselves.
Don’t let shrink win. Petrosoft’s Loss Prevention Analytics provides the insight and tools to take back control, backed by AI, video, and the power of your store’s data.
