The NRF announced Tuesday that retail theft is on the rise as a result of the economy. As a retail store owner, there are five steps you can take to reduce theft:

1. Greet every customer within the first 30 seconds of them entering the store—research has shown that acknowledging your customers reduces theft. The potential thief is made aware that you're alert and watching them—they'd rather increase their chances and move to another store where they can steal under the radar.

2. Eliminate blind spots in the store—Try to create a clear line of vision from your cash wrap to your entire store. This prevents potential thieves from hiding behind a corner and tucking something in their pocket.

3. Have video cameras on display—even if they aren't real, video cameras serve as a major deterrent. One of my retail friends who couldn't afford real cameras for her store purchased old, damaged ones on eBay. (If you order non-working cameras, have them shipped to your home, not your store.)

4. Have your sales team circulate on the floor—check in on your customers once in a while, even if they tell you they're just browsing.

5. Do an inventory check regularly—by monitoring your inventory you can keep track of the merchandise that is most frequently stolen. You can then relocate high theft items.

Yesterday on GIFT SHOP's forum, there was an interesting discussion about the value of using Twitter.

Melissa of Candid Gifts wrote, "Twitter definitely has measurable results. I had $350 in sales from people coming to us from Twitter in January alone. I was totally against using it at first, but really can see a difference in website hits, and walk-in biz. It takes time to see results, but stick w/ it and it will pay off. You are able to directly answer questions, and set yourself up as an expert very quickly!"

I've just started using Twitter myself, so I was surprised to hear about that kind of success. Has anyone else found Twitter to be useful for your store or company?

My husband the techie (he doesn't like to be called one, but he is) suggested I try twittering. For those of you not familiar with Twitter.com, it's a social networking site where people make daily posts about what they're working on or doing during the day. Knowing only a little about it, I thought, "Great I don't even blog every day (much to our web editor's dismay), would I really be able to make five to six tweets a day?"

Then yesterday I received an email from a friend, Ted Teele of OneCoast, asking me if I'd twittered yet. This was the final kick I needed, so I went to the website, registered myself and even made my first post. I have to say, I'm surprised how user friendly it is.

I've signed up to "follow" fellow tweeters, and it's really very interesting. (You can follow me to at Twitter.com/retailexpert.)

Have you tried Twitter yet? Let me know what you think.

Last week I received a copy of an industry trade magazine for publishers, and it had the best cover copy I've seen in a long time—"A recession is a terrible thing to waste."

It got me thinking that while a recession is very difficult for business owners, the silver lining is that opportunities do come out of it. As an entrepreneur and eternal optimist, I immediately began thinking of good things that can come out of a recession.

1. It forces business owners to think about everything, from running our operations more efficiently, to maintaining better inventory control, to staffing. Everything should be considered as an opportunity to cost costs or generate more revenue.

2. You can't just sit still in a recession—you have to take action. Only the strong are going to survive, so it forces us to get to the top of our game.

3. Even in a good economy product(s) are important. Now they are essential. You have to focus on what's selling, and sell more of it.

4. It weeds out the competition. If you can survive the hard times, there will be less competition when the good times come back.

5. It puts us to the test as entrepreneurs. If you can get through this—you can get through anything!

There's no doubt that American buying behavior has changed dramatically over the past six months—so what are we still buying, and how?

Time Magazine just published a fabulous interview with Paco Underhill, CEO of Envirosell, a consulting firm and author of Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping. Underhill made some great observations about how the retail landscape will alter as a result of changed buying behavior.

Here are five points he made that are worth noting:

1. Americans are definitely cutting back on spending. According to Underhill, "the era of bling is over."

2. The demographic profile of people who are willing to "shop down" is expanding. There is a new willingness for a lot of customers to go to discount stores to save money—ones who didn't go there in the past.

3. Making your store bigger doesn't mean the customer will spend more time or money in it. It's counterproductive to be sitting on more inventory that isn't selling. Retailers will need to make better choices about the inventory they stock.

4. Retailers will have to become more female friendly, because women are the "engines of consumption… the purchasing agent for the family."

5. Retailers need to switch their mindset. Rather than thinking, "I have a store and a website [two separate entities]." They need to start thinking, "I have an online business with a physical manifestation."

I was reading an article in Fortune magazine, Discounters Lose Their Edge, about how discount retailers such as T.J. Maxx and Loehmann's might be up against some tough competition as department stores cut their prices to stay in business. While discounters' store numbers haven't shown a dip yet, the writer predicts, "Department stores will only become a bigger headache for discounters. Offering similar-priced goods in a nicer environment than the hand-to-hand combat associated with discounters gives them a leg up and in this economy every edge counts."

So while department stores and discount stores "duke" it out—where does that leave you, the specialty store owner? Stay focused on delivering unique products, with superior customer service, at a fair and reasonable price. If you can do that, then I strongly believe you can survive this crazy economic battle for consumer dollars.

A few weeks ago I attended Christmasworld, an international gift fair in Frankfurt, Germany. It was interesting to see that overall show traffic was quite good despite a slowed international economy. While many exhibitors reported that sales were down from previous years, there was quite a bit of optimism since orders were being written—similar to Q1 show sentiments here in the US.

One thing I loved about the show was that management invited three industry experts from a local trends agency to research and present trends in decorating, fashion and design, and since the trends are definitely parallel to what we're seeing in the US, I'm going to cover them here.

The four trends discussed by Claudia Herke, Annetta Palmisano and Cem Bora of bora.herke were airy, sweet, comfort and obsession.

Airy
This trend was described as a style which, "radiates modern lightness: fragile, gentle, transparent, yet very contemporary." The color palette for this trend includes pastels, ranging from cream to rose to light gray, and is always in combination with lots of white. This trend may be expressed through the use of translucent materials, cut glass, fine line drawings, flowers, reliefs, embossing, engraving and the use of light and shadow effects.

An exhibit was set up for attendees and exhibitors to walk through and see the tends translated into products. This photo illustrates the trend "airy" through the use of glass. I thought it was very creative that the ornaments were hung from the ceiling in a group—it could make a great store window display.

Sweet
Sweet was discussed as a trend that is "feminine, sensual and with countless accessories." The color palette ranges from sand, aqua and turquoise to violet, lime and slate gray. Products that fall into this area include "sugar-coated" surfaces, candied and glazed, and materials such as plastics, lacquer and tulle.

This photo illustrates the use of feminine touches on a teapot set, and a few ornaments with a glitter sugar coating.

Comfort
Comfort was described as "modern style with traditional elements." One example would be a display that uses lots of natural stone combined with metallic finishes, such as chrome and aluminum, or mirrors and glass with lambskin, leathers and corduroy. The color palette includes muted colors like slate gray, graphite and caramel combined with crimson. Products in this category might have a touch of futuristic combined with traditional elements.

This photo illustrates the comfort trend—aluminum vases combined with a more traditional element, ie., the felt runner.

Obsession
Obsession was described as "feminine elegance and exclusiveness." The colors include mahogany, shades of violet and gold illuminated with rose quartz and mauve. Products in this category would be made out of lead crystal, marble and fine woods.

This photo illustrates the obsession trend—opulent colors and materials, including an ornate chandelier, gold walls and purple accent ornaments.

I observed my own German product trends as well—stay tuned for those.

Last night when my husband was surfing on YouTube he found this clever "commercial" a guy created on his Palm Treo for Trader Joe's. (For those of you not familiar with Trader Joe's, it's a grocery store chain that specializes in local produce, organic goods and that has a very dedicated fan base. They call themselves a "neighborhood grocery store.")

The video is very funny and had both of us laughing out loud. Then I thought: what a great social marketing tool. Imagine hiring a clever college student to make a song/video about shopping in your store. You could post it on YouTube, add the link to your website and send out emails with the link to your friends.

We read a lot of the comments below the video, and while some people do think that Trader Joe's paid the guy to make it, it doesn't really matter. It's funny and so far over 124,000 people have viewed it. And I bet some of them will go check out Trader Joe's because of it.

What do you think? Clever idea, or thumbs down?