The latest annual Centre for Retail Research (CRR) survey into the use of CCTV in retail – commissioned by Axis Communications, the network video product company – over 60 per cent of UK retailers are planning to adopt network IP in the next three years and nearly a third have adopted it already. That’s up from a quarter in 2012.
Atul Rajput, pictured, regional director, northern Europe at Axis Communications, said: “Certainly for the UK, I believe that the migration to network IP has become the norm and it’s no longer a question of ‘if’ but ‘when’ the technology will be adopted.”
Some 278 UK retailers responded to the survey, encompassing some 20,350 stores . Nine in ten, 92.8pc of these use CCTV. Of these, 32.1pc have already upgraded to network IP technology – a 2.5pc rise in the take up from the previous year’s figures. This trend is even more pronounced across the wider northern European region, with a 58.5pc (weighted average) of analogue users now planning to switch to network IP – representing a significant increase of 17pc on 2012 figures.
The survey suggested that customer theft is still the biggest security challenge facing retailers as nearly a quarter (24.2pc) said that the main reason for using CCTV is to prevent or investigate theft and 80pc of respondents cited prevention of internal or external theft and safety as the main driver for use of CCTV.
The survey included a case study of The Co-operative Food which reported an average halving in reported instances of crime and a significant reduction in unrecorded loss from theft of attractive commodities in stores where Axis cameras had been installed.
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