If you’ve ever entered a Walmart (WMT) store and got a hunch that someone was following you, it may have not just been paranoia.
A former Walmart employee is going viral on TikTok after he revealed the creepy way workers at the company’s stores are instructed to follow shoppers to prevent theft.
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In a TikTok video, which was posted on Aug. 13 and has so far amassed over 600,000 views, TikTok user Bigbagspenny616, said that when he was an employee at the company, he was a “floor walker,” which is an employee who is responsible for looking out for retail theft. He claims that floor walkers start stalking customers in the parking lot and will continue to follow them as they shop in the store.
“The very first thing you want to look out for is that we're always stationed in our cars, and when you pull in, that's when we get to go ahead to follow you into the store,” he said in the video.
“This gives the illusion that we arrived at the store the same time as you did.”
The former employee also claimed that each floor walker has “one prime target at a time,” and that 50 to 200 customers at a store can be targeted by floor walkers per day.
“So if I follow you into the store, you're my prime target until you check out, this means I have to stay with you from start to finish,” he said.
The TikToker also claimed that floor walkers are “all over the place,” and that they work together and communicate with each other through earbuds. They are also instructed to film shoppers who are suspected of stealing.
“When you check out, we have to check out with you and walk out to our car, just like you're walking out to your car,” he said in the video. “If you're suspected of any kind of theft, we are mandated to film you, then watch you put your groceries away, just in case later on we have to use this in court.”
@bigbagspenny616 #TikTokCreatorSearchInsightsIncentive i use to be a floor walker until i got fired. Now im letting everyone in on what i know!!! #creatoracedemy #walmart #floorwalker
♬ original sound - bigbagspenny616
In a separate video, which was posted on Aug. 16, the TikToker also suggested that Walmart uses floor walkers to help land insurance coverage for its business.
“If a company owns millions of dollars worth of stuff in their store, and it's not locked up, and they got to get an insurance company to agree to cover them, don't you think they got to have something a little more in place than ‘we're just getting robbed?’” he said. “No insurance company would ever take their business unless they could say, ‘hey, you know, not only are we locking things up, not only do we have cameras, we have a whole team of loss prevention people to attack theft, so can you cover us now?”
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Walmart's floor walker teams spark controversy
Many TikTok users took to the comment section under the former employee’s viral video to claim that they were creeped out by Walmart’s theft prevention tactics.
“Wait every time you go in Walmart you get followed? Thats a bit creepy lol,” wrote one TikTok user.
“My floorwalker needs to be more responsible and tell me where I parked because half the time I forget,” wrote another user.
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“I had a man following me, I was actually scared and had to have the manager walk me out. He let me know it was their LP guy. Freaky experience,” claimed a TikToker.
Walmart’s controversial floor walker tactic is nothing new and ironically resulted in a lawsuit in 2016. In the lawsuit, a shopper claimed that a floor walker at a Walmart store in Florida falsely accused her of stealing, which resulted in a "forced takedown and false arrest scheme."
Walmart, like other major retailers, have been struggling with a rise in retail theft at its stores. According to a recent report for Gitnux, Walmart loses $3 billion per year due to theft, while over 900,000 shoplifting incidents take place at its U.S. stores annually.
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