Using AI-Powered Cloud Video Surveillance To Fortify Convenience Store Security

In today’s fast-paced retail environment, convenience stores face a unique set of challenges when it comes to security. These stores serve as essential community resources, offering fuel, snacks, and everyday necessities to the customers who frequent these shops, often multiple times a week. However, because of their accessibility and extended hours, convenience stores also tend to be a common target for criminal activity, exposing customers to dangerous situations. Additionally, employees can be at risk of potential workplace injuries, whether from operational issues or violent customers. Finally, valuable assets, especially gas station pumps, are vulnerable to damage while having to meet compliance regulations.

Effective security solutions are needed for protecting staff, customers, and inventory. As threats intensify, AI-powered cloud video surveillance offers a powerful and advanced solution to help streamline investigations into incidents, while providing greater visibility into store and fuel pump damage.

Robbery, Employee Safety, and Damaged Assets: Convenience Store Challenges Explored

Robbery, Theft, and Violent Crime

Convenience stores and gas stations rank as some of the top sites for violent crime in the United States. According to CSP Daily News, convenience stores are the fourth most common location for violent crime, while gas stations rank in seventh place. The FBI reports that in 2022, convenience stores and gas stations combined accounted for 13.8% of robberies nationwide.

ATM skimming is another growing concern, with known bad actors discreetly placing devices on ATMs or gas pumps to retrieve and steal customer card data. In addition, gasoline drive-offs, where individuals pump fuel and leave without paying, represent a source of revenue loss, cutting into profit margins and creating operational burdens for store operators.

To combat these recurring issues, convenience store organizations need surveillance solutions that can help identify video of suspicious or criminal activity and quickly share it with law enforcement to strengthen store safety.

Employee Safety During Shifts

The physical and emotional well-being of staff is paramount to store success. Employees routinely face hazards, from lifting heavy objects to equipment falling, as well as slips, trips, and falls. The ever-present risk of robbery further compounds these concerns, as violent confrontations during incidents can place staff in immediate danger.

Beyond external threats, internal altercations between customers, employees, or both can also compromise workplace safety. Access to reliable video footage allows store management to investigate these incidents thoroughly and take corrective action.

Damage to Gas Station Pumps

Fuel pumps are a priority for many convenience stores, as over 80% of these stores sell gas. Customer damage to gas pumps is common, whether it’s someone accidentally driving away with the nozzle still attached to their car, damage to balusters, or colliding with the pump itself.

Gas stations may also be required to maintain video security around fuel pumps and meet specific retention requirements to ensure footage is preserved. A camera outage at an active pump can create compliance risk for store operators. Proactive system health monitoring ensures coverage gaps are caught early, supporting both regulatory compliance and response to incidents and insurance claims.

How AI-Powered Convenience Store Surveillance Helps Improve Security

To help convenience stores investigate incidents of crime or employee safety, as well as any damage done to store property, cloud video surveillance offers a powerful range of tools designed to streamline investigations and monitoring of camera health around key areas, such as gas pumps. These include intelligent search options powered by AI video analytics, fast video clip export and sharing, and automated health monitoring, all of which work together in a cloud video platform to help convenience stores build safer locations for customers and employees.

Quickly Find Video With Intelligent Search

Manually combing through hours of surveillance footage after an incident occurs is not only tedious, but it also delays critical actions like reporting a crime to police, supporting an injured employee, or processing an insurance claim. Cloud-managed video surveillance empowers store managers and operators to quickly locate specific incidents by leveraging intelligent search features.

AI-powered visual search can help locate video through intuitive natural-language searches. Store operators can simply enter a query (for example, “Person wearing green hoodie at store entrance in the morning”) and quickly receive the most relevant results. Additionally, similarity search offers convenience store operators the ability to search for similar persons or vehicles by selecting an existing object in the scene to quickly find video across cameras and locations. Attribute filters help quickly identify video of individuals with specific clothing colors, or vehicles by type and color. This enables staff to swiftly surface the footage needed in seconds versus hours, streamlining investigations and helping build safer environments.

Share Clips via Cloud Connectivity

The ability to export and securely share tagged video clips is an essential component of effective incident response. Cloud video streamlines this process by enabling authorized users to rapidly share relevant clips, regardless of their physical location. Seamless sharing simplifies the investigative process, reduces friction, and speeds up resolution.

Additionally, law enforcement agencies frequently contact convenience stores for evidence of crimes occurring on or near store property. By having a cloud-managed video solution, businesses will be able to easily provide footage that helps support ongoing cases. This helps improve the security of not just the store itself but the community as a whole.

Monitor Gas Pumps To Identify Property Damage

Fuel pumps are essential, highly regulated assets. Ensuring cameras remain operational at these locations is critical for compliance and security. Automated health monitoring features available in a cloud-managed video security platform can alert operators immediately if a camera goes offline or if a recorder’s storage is at capacity, enabling prompt action to restore coverage and maintain regulatory compliance.

Cloud storage also helps meet retention needs by preserving footage for required periods, as well as integrating with solutions that can help increase storage via offsite cloud storage options. This is particularly valuable for stores operating in states with extended retention mandates of 60 days or more. Additionally, in cases where accidental damage to a pump occurs or there’s vandalism done to property, operators can quickly find, save, and share relevant video with insurance agencies thanks to the cloud video platform.

Protect Customers, Employees, and Assets With OpenEye

Employee safety and customer safety are at the heart of successful convenience store management. The cloud video surveillance features outlined above empower operators to mitigate risks, resolve incidents faster, and create a safer environment for everyone.

OpenEye delivers a flexible, scalable cloud video platform designed specifically for the needs of convenience stores and gas stations. With intelligent search tools, cloud-based clip sharing, and automated health monitoring, OpenEye Web Services (OWS) makes it easy to protect employees and assets across the entire organization.

Explore how OWS can help transform store security and operational efficiency.

FAQs: Convenience Store Security

What is convenience store video surveillance?

Convenience store video surveillance is the video system a convenience store uses to improve the security of its properties. Features of a convenience store camera system can include cloud capabilities, such as centralized management and remote access, AI video analytics, and system health monitoring. 

What are the biggest security risks for convenience stores?

Some of the biggest security risks for convenience stores include robbery, theft, violent crime, overall employee safety, and damage to gas pumps. Each of these risks can jeopardize the security of people and facilities for convenience store organizations. 

How can video surveillance improve convenience store security?

Video surveillance can improve convenience store security by streamlining investigations into past incidents while enabling proactive response to situations. This is enabled through features available in a video security platform including centralized management, remote access, and AI-powered video analytics. 

How does AI video surveillance help convenience stores?

AI video surveillance can help convenience stores improve their security by providing proactive alerts to unique situations and streamlining investigations into past incidents through intelligent search features. AI video surveillance can also help optimize operations for convenience stores by automating certain manual processes, such as walkthroughs to verify merchandise is adequately stocked, as well as by providing insights into customer behavior with traffic count analytics. 

What are the benefits of cloud video surveillance for convenience stores?

Cloud video surveillance can benefit convenience stores in numerous ways. With an AI-powered, open cloud video security platform, convenience stores can manage location security remotely, integrate disparate business systems, streamline investigations with intelligent search features, and use proactive alerts to strengthen security and improve operations.