A branch of the US-wide supermarket Target has been locking aisle after aisle of products away behind security doors as shoplifting soars.
Footage taken at the store in San Francisco show much of the toiletries and cosmetics locked up.
Although it's usual to lock up certain items, the security at this store has gone above and beyond.
The lockdown had been underway since October last year at the Folsom Street store near the city’s Mission District, reports WNCT-TV.
A 2022 retail security survey from the National Retail Federation (NRF) ranked San Francisco/Oakland as the second-most hard-hit metropolitan area for theft in 2020 and 2021.
The NRF has listed items like body wash and over-the-counter medication as items that are particularly attractive to thieves.
These products can often be sold on the black market to smaller stores.
The Bay Area, where San Francisco lies, has been especially hard hit by the petty crime epidemic that has swept across the US.
A Target spokesperson said: "Like other retailers, organized retail crime is a concern across our business.
"We’re taking proactive measures to keep our teams and guests safe while deterring and preventing theft. These mitigation efforts include hiring additional security guards, adding third-party guard services at select locations, and using new technologies and tools to protect merchandise from being stolen.
"We are working with legislators, law enforcement, and retail industry partners to support public policy that would help achieve our goals of creating a safe environment in our stores and keeping our doors open in communities across the country."
Walgreens recently closed five San Francisco stores due to theft.
A Whole Foods Market in downtown San Francisco also closed two weeks ago, due to concerns about crime and “high theft”.
Of the retailers surveyed by the NRF, 71 per cent said they had seen a “substantial” or “moderate” increase in organised retail crime, with 55 per saying that policies stop the use of cash bail for non-violent crimes in cities like San Francisco are to blame.
Violent crime has also been in the spotlight in San Francisco due to two high-profile incidents.
Firstly the fatal stabbing murder of tech entrepreneur Bob Lee earlier this month and the crowbar attack on Fire Commissioner Don Carmignani a day later.
Commissioner Carmignani was left fighting for his life in hospital.
San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors voted last week to approve a new lucrative police contract to try to counteract staffing shortages among the police force.
“People want our officers to focus on the open-air drug dealing, retail theft, home burglaries, and violence impacting our neighbourhoods, but we need more police to deliver,” Mayor London Breed said.
Dad-of-two Bob Lee was found with stab wounds on April 4 in the early hours near San Francisco's city centre.
He was allegedly driven to a secluded spot and stabbed over an apparent dispute regarding the suspect's sister, prosecutors have said in a court document.
The killing was "planned and deliberate" with the Cash App founder being left to "slowly die", according to the document.
The motion to detain suspect Nima Momeni, 38, without bail is the first official account of exactly what may have led to the death of Lee in an empty part of downtown San Francisco in the early hours of April 4.
Momeni was arrested on Thursday, April 13, and appeared in court the following day. He did not enter a plea, nor did he speak except to say "Yes your honour", when the judge asked if he agreed to decline his right to a speedy trial.
