Shop theft in England and Wales jumped 13% in the year to June 2025, topping 529,994 incidents, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
The previous ONS shoplifting figures - covering the year to March 2025 - reported a 20% increase, suggesting the rate of growth is beginning to slow.
Andrew Goodacre, chief executive of the British Independent Retail Association (Bira), said the slower rise “raises serious concerns about underreporting”.
Bira’s recent crime survey found the vast majority of crimes now go unreported - 91% of physical abuse incidents and 47% of thefts - because retailers have “lost faith in police response”.
Speaking to Convenience Store, Goodacre said: “The disconnect between what independent retailers are experiencing daily and what appears in official police-recorded statistics is widening.
“We believe the slower rate of increase in the ONS figures may well reflect falling reporting rates rather than falling crime rates. The true scale of retail crime is likely far greater than even these alarming official statistics suggest.”
Meanwhile, Association of Convenience Stores (ACS) chief executive James Lowman believed the gap between reporting and actual crime is “starting to close”.
The ACS’ 2025 Crime Report found convenience retailers were hit with 6.2 million incidents of shop theft in the past year.
The trade body said the latest ONS figures present a “significant gap” between what is happening on the ground and what is being recorded by forces.
“There have been welcome developments recently on police action to tackle retail crime, particularly with the introduction of a trial in Sussex to fit electronic monitoring tags to prolific offenders, and Operation Zoridon in London which targeted retailers selling stolen and illicit goods,” said Lowman.
“Furthermore, the Crime and Policing Bill will be introduced early next year, making it a separate offence to assault a shopworker among other measures. ACS has been calling for a complete reset on the perception of retail crime and especially shop theft, with an ambition to send a clear message that theft is a crime that will be investigated by local forces.”
The Fed’s national president Hetal Patel said the new ONS figures ”come as no surprise to independent retailers”.
“We hope that the latest disturbing statistics on shoplifting encourage the government to provide the financial help that is urgently needed to tackle the surge in retail crime,” said Patel.
“We welcomed the government’s summer blitz on town centre crime and the fact that it has pledged to put 3,000 new neighbourhood officers on the beat as part of its Plan for Change, but these numbers show more must be done.
”The introduction of a standalone offence for attacking shopworkers, which is currently making its way through parliament, is also a step in the right direction, as is the scrapping of the so called £200 threshold.
“However, for years we have called on the government to provide grants for small retail business to help increase their security through improved CCTV. This would act as a deterrent to potential thieves and give store owners the ability to provide solid evidence to catch and punish the perpetrators.
“We also want the courts and law enforcement to work more effectively together to provide a robust judicial response to those who are charged and subsequently convicted.
Responding to the ONS stats, Lucy Whing, crime policy adviser at the British Retail Consortium, said: “Retail theft is a major issue for retailers, costing over £2.2bn a year. While ONS figures do not reveal the true scale of the issue as it only tracks reported incidents, it chimes with our own statistics which show shoplifting soaring in recent years.
”The causes are manifold, but the rise in organised crime is a particular concern, with gangs systematically hitting stores one after another, all over the country.”
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