The Retail Trust has teamed up with intelligence store solutions provider SAI in a bid to create safer environments for colleagues and customers.

SAI has become an official partner of the charity, with both working to support retail workers’ safety and wellbeing.

Already working with major grocers, including the Big Four, Iceland and Our Coop, SAI’s solution is designed to unify Loss Prevention (LP) and insight-led store operations.

Using its patented Visual Language Model (VLM), the SAI One platform blends computer vision with GenAI to turn traditionally ‘passive’ store surveillance systems into an active, operational platform for real-time store intelligence.

As part of its work with grocers on LP, SAI helps retailers reduce in-store violence, colleague abuse and shrink via its facial recognition technology (FRT) solution.

Additionally, SAI redistributes earnings from its violence prevention and FRT systems, setting them aside as a charitable trust.

It then uses these funds to support causes and charities that champion store safety, spanning colleague protection and wellbeing, rehabilitation projects supporting those with addictions who turn to shoplifting, and wider work with the policing and justice communities.

“When we launched SAI, we knew we never wanted to profit from violence – we’d rather there was no need for this technology at all,”  explained Helen Wilde, co-founder & chief commercial officer at SAI. “But with more and more retailers coming to us and needing our solution to tackle the problem, we decided to ensure revenues generated from this part of the business were used to do good and give back.”

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In addition to supporting the charity, SAI will develop new ways to use intelligence help tackle repeat offenders. With the top 10 per cent of repeat retail offenders estimated to be responsible for between 68 – 70 per cent of total in-store retail crime, its efforts will help reduce retail loss while making stores safer spaces for colleagues and communities.

Chris Brook-Carter, chief executive of the Retail Trust, said: “We are grateful for SAI’s support as we explore new ways of protecting retail workers against abuse, violence and theft and the impact this can have on their wellbeing. Our partnership will build on the help the Retail Trust is already providing to hundreds of retailers and people working across the industry to create happier and safer retail workplaces.”

The partnership with the Retail Trust comes as SAI prepares to launch its new Safer Stores initiative, which brings together stakeholders – from major retailers to crime and justice bodies, rehabilitation groups and technology providers – in a shared mission to improve the safety of bricks-and-mortar environments.

Meanwhile, hundreds of businesses will back the Retail Trust’s Let’s Respect Retail campaign this Christmas by increasing employee support and calling for more respect from shoppers.

In the past few months, Aldi and M&S have both committed to publicly backing the “Let’s Respect Retail” campaign.

Wilde added: “We’ve long admired the work the Retail Trust does – both through the practical support it delivers to retail workers and by championing colleague wellbeing through awareness campaigns. This made partnering with them a natural step as we further our commitment to creating safer retail environments that support colleagues, customers and communities.”