Supermarkets in Japan are having a hard time combating an increasing number of shoplifters who use their reusable shopping bags to conceal unpaid goods.
The issue has arisen in the three months since all retailers were required to start charging customers for plastic bags in an effort to reduce plastic waste.
At Akidai Sekimachi Honten, a supermarket in Tokyo’s Nerima Ward, about 80 percent of its customers started bringing their own bags after July, which prompted the store to tighten security against shoplifters.
Many shoplifters simply put groceries in their own shopping bags and leave, according to the store. In one incident, a shopper with a store shopping basket containing unpaid products bypassed the checkout counter and put them in their own bag.
After the incident, the store started using different colors for baskets before and after payment.
Another headache for the store is that some customers who forget to bring their own shopping bags carry groceries home in store baskets.
About 20 baskets have been stolen in the past few months, equivalent to the amount lost in one year before the store started charging for plastic bags.
