12 BULLETIN 1044, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
in a service store, others that it is no more in the former than in the 
latter, and some dealers believe that it exists in self-service to such 
an extent as to make the plan entirely impracticable. It is almost 
impossible to determine the exact percentage of loss from this cause 
in any store. Therefore the views held are practically the result of 
supposition and incomplete observation. 
" Don't you lose a great deal of merchandise under this plan ? " is 
the first question usually put to operators of self-serve stores. Under 
all other methods of distribution the potential customers have become 
so accustomed to having restrictions imposed upon them as to their 
movements while in any store that they do not seem to be able to 
grasp the feasibility of allowing free access to all merchandise. 
Assuming that one of the impressions of the average customer in 
first coming into a self-service store is the ease with which small 
articles could be taken from the store without detection, since by far 
the greater majority of people are honest in practice, no action 
would result from it. This leaves only a small percentage who might 
be influenced by the thought. Is it not fair to assume that a large 
proportion of these would not put their impulses into action because 
of their fear of detection in passing the cashier? Simultaneously 
with the thought of stealing comes the fear of detection, and this 
fear would overcome the impulse to steal in a majority of cases. 
This leaves a very small percentage who might actually put their 
impulses into action, but the percentage is large enough to receive 
considerable attention. The composition of this small group, the 
extent to which they pilfer, and the nature of their pilfering are 
matters about which little is known. From the experience of nu- 
merous operators, it seems that the persons who attempt to pilfer 
are by no means confined to the poorer classes and that the articles 
taken are not those which would be classed as necessities. ' The 
articles taken are necessarily usually small and more or less high 
priced, such as fancy sardines, anchovy paste, potted chicken, and 
small bottles of olive oil. 
The actual extent of losses specifically from petty thievery has 
been variously estimated from almost nothing to 4 or 5 per cent 
of the total sales. A more common estimate is around 1 per cent. 
Through a system of retail stock control, which will be taken up in 
detail later, it is possible to determine rather accurately the shrink- 
age in the merchandise from all causes. This shrinkage is the differ- 
ence between the value at selling price of the stock placed on sale 
and the money which is taken in, and is the result of various causes, 
including loss through overweight, evaporation, spoilage, deteriora- 
tion, errors made by the cashier or clerk, and petty thievery, both on 
the part of employees and customers. It is impossible to segregate 
