In October 2024, the National Retail Federation stopped publishing the annual shrink report it had produced for more than three decades.
The stated reason: "a broad study about retail shrink is no longer sufficient for capturing the key challenges and needs of the industry." What replaced it was a study of "the landscape of retail theft and violence."
Two editions have appeared since. In the 2025 edition, the headline finding is not a dollar figure. It is this: threats or acts of violence during theft events rose 17% in a single year.
The body that defined how this industry counts loss decided the dollars were no longer the point. If you still open your quarterly review with a shrink basis-point chart, you are presenting a metric your own federation retired.
This edition is about the number that replaced it, and the gap between what your workforce is experiencing and what anyone is measuring.
What the worker-level data says
The associate-safety numbers have moved in one direction, across independent sources.
22% of retail workers experienced or witnessed a physical assault in 2025, up from 14% in 2024 — a 57% increase in one year. 35% said they had felt unsafe at work, up from 27% (Loss Prevention Research Council with Verkada and The Harris Poll, 1,000 US retail workers).
52% said they are likely to leave their job within twelve months because of safety concerns. 25% had already considered it, up from 19%. That is a staffing cost, and staffing costs are a language your CFO already speaks.
61% of retail workers faced verbally abusive, threatening or unruly customers — the highest of any public-facing sector. Those employees were 1.9x more likely to feel unsafe and 1.6x more likely to hesitate before reporting a concern (Perceptyx, 21,000 frontline employees).
Retail trade is now the second-largest sector for workplace assaults, at roughly 1,835 annualized cases in 2023–24, as nonfatal workplace assaults grew 5.3% annually since 2011 (NCCI, April 2026).
Of 306 fatal work injuries in retail trade in 2023, 94 were homicides — about 30% (US Bureau of Labor Statistics).
The complication worth saying out loud
Most commentary on this topic stops there. It shouldn't.
Police-reported violence in and around retail is not rising the way retailer-reported violence is. The Council on Criminal Justice's mid-year 2026 update puts robbery down 17% year over year and 41% below 2019, with aggravated assault down 2%. In CCJ's earlier analysis, fewer than 2% of reported shoplifting incidents involved an assault or another crime.
So worker surveys say violence is sharply up, and crime statistics say the opposite or say nothing.
Both can be true. Retail associates now absorb aggression that never becomes a police report: verbal threats, intimidation during a walk-out, a raised fist at self-checkout. None of it is a crime statistic. All of it is a resignation letter.
That gap is the entire management problem. The exposure is real, it is growing, and it lives outside every instrument your organization currently uses.
A perspective from the field
This industry spent three years arguing about a number and lost the plot on the people. We built cases, quantified shrink to two decimals, and lobbied for statutes. Meanwhile a quarter of the workforce started thinking about quitting over how the job feels.
I would rather explain a shrink basis point I missed than explain why an associate was assaulted in a building where I owned the risk and never counted the incidents. The uncomfortable part is that nobody is going to ask me for that count. Which is exactly why bringing it is worth something.
The regulators are moving. The disclosure is not.
Three obligations are already law:
California has required a written workplace violence prevention plan, a violent incident log and employee training since July 1, 2024 (Labor Code § 6401.9). Cal/OSHA must adopt a permanent general-industry standard by December 31, 2026, and the draft hazard list reads like a store operations audit: solitary work, poor visibility, public access, cash on hand, late-night shifts.
New York's Retail Worker Safety Act took effect June 2, 2025 for employers with 10 or more retail employees. Silent response buttons become mandatory for employers with 500+ retail employees nationwide on January 1, 2027.
Virginia HB 1919 requires a workplace violence policy at every employer with 100+ employees, effective January 1, 2027.
Now the uncomfortable half, because this brief does not sell a trend that is not there. The SEC pulled its expanded human capital disclosure proposal from both regulatory agendas in 2025. Among S&P 100 companies, qualitative workplace safety disclosure fell from 63% to 55% between 2023 and 2024, and only 9% disclosed anything quantitative. Neither Target's 2025 proxy nor Walmart's 2026 proxy assigns associate safety to a board committee or ties it to executive pay.
Your board is not about to start asking. The disclosure machinery is drifting away from this, not toward it. That is the opening, not the obstacle.
Three practical moves for the next 90 days
Build the incident log before a regulator requires it. California already mandates one; New York and Virginia deadlines land January 1, 2027. The organizations that will struggle are the ones starting the count in month one of enforcement.
Count what never becomes a police report. Verbal threats, aggression during a merchandise recovery, associates declining to intervene. Edition #09 argued apprehensions are a vanity metric. This is the number that replaces it.
Pair every safety figure with a turnover figure and take both to the audit committee yourself. Nobody will request it. The first LP leader in the building to walk in with a defensible safety number owns the conversation that follows.
Closing note
The federation moved the metric two years ago. The regulators are moving now. The board is the last stop.
There is a version of this where LP spends another three years defending a shrink chart while HR, legal and operations divide up the safety conversation among themselves. That version ends with a smaller mandate.
If you have already built the violence count — or tried and hit resistance — I want to hear how it went. Reply with anything you can share, anonymized always.
Forward this to one LP or AP leader who should be reading it.
— Gabriel
The LP Brief is a weekly intelligence read for senior loss prevention and asset protection leaders. Free. No vendor noise.
Not yet subscribed? thelpbrief.com