Organized Retail Crime Prevention at Meijer

On this episode of Retail’s Most Wanted, we sat down with Melissa Wacha, Director of Asset Protection Operations and Investigations at Meijer. With over 20 years of retail experience, Melissa has demonstrated exceptional skill in driving innovation, building cross-functional relationships, and developing effective leadership strategies to protect assets and ensure operational excellence.

Why it matters:

Melissa Wacha, leading asset protection at Meijer, shares insights on fighting retail crime through technology integration and law enforcement partnerships.

Key takeaways:

• Technology integration is crucial: Meijer focuses on creating a "single pane of glass" system to streamline investigations and evidence gathering across multiple software platforms

• Multi-jurisdictional challenges: Coordinating between different law enforcement agencies requires consistent documentation and standardized evidence sharing processes

• Success story: Recently closed a $1M case involving loyalty program fraud, working with Michigan AG's task force and FBI

Emerging threats:

• Digital fraud growing: Omnichannel retail expansion creates new vulnerabilities in:

  • Third-party systems

  • Account takeovers

  • Fraud rule exploitation

The bottom line:

Retailers must adapt to both physical and digital threats while strengthening law enforcement partnerships and investing in unified technology solutions.