Pros And Cons Of Retail Profiling

In the business world, corporations use retail profiling as a tool to prevent crime or fraud within their store locations. Retail profiling is a discriminatory practice, which allows the workers to focus on the race of the customer, to deem someone suspicious of offenses. Retail profiling is an issue because it targets shoppers, effects the trust of the customers, and also gives white shoppers an unfair advantage.
Many employees that work for corporations are instructed to profile shoppers by many factors like appearance (clothing or mannerisms) and race. For example, Zara USA, a clothing store, have set regulations based on race and even have security codes for their minority customers (Crowder 8). Although every business have varying rules …show more content…
An example, Cheryl Johnson was wrongly accused of stealing and waited hours to be released, despite the fact there was no true evidence to support the claim (Dunn). Making customers feel uncomfortable to shop at a store will hurt business and the likeliness of that customer ever returning to the store. If security and coworkers are more neutral, it will create a more comfortable environment to all shoppers instead of focusing on skin tone. I have personally felt unease about shopping at Sephora because I was followed around the store by multiple workers my whole visit. I had a $200 order and the cashier even went to the extent of calling her manager to stand with her during the transaction. Following my purchase, I was followed out of the store which really hurt my feelings. I was offended because I was capable of purchasing the items and I felt embarrassed when other customers watched me leave, even though I was innocent. Therefore, I took my business strictly online for Sephora, yet many customers would never give their money to the business they felt so attacked in. Enforced attitudes by a store employee should not be acted out without true evidence or stronger suspicion than just