Top Ten Holiday Shopping Safety Tips for 2014

It is that time of year for Christmas shopping. With ‘black Friday’ starts the biggest shopping days of the year. And the bad guys know it too. They salivate over women with kids and seniors in mall parking lots loaded with goodies, kids and money. They are ripe and vulnerable targets.

Stores do the best they can to get you to spend your money. Mall owners are doing a better job with lighting in parking lots. But mothers, especially those with kids, and seniors make excellent targets for the bad guys.

Thousands of robberies happen this time of year and most of them never get solved. Part of the reason assaults and robberies go up at this time of year is because of stressful economic conditions for families.

Picture this. A mom with her kids or a senior comes out of the mall on the way to the car. The parking lot isn’t all that well lit. Maybe she is pushing a cart or carrying bags or on her smart phone. Maybe some distractions???

That makes a target for the bad guys who can get behind her and rip away her purse.

With Christmas getting closer, the big malls are gearing up. Are you?

Here are some safety tips to help keep you and your family safe.

1. Shop-avoid night trips if at all possible.
2. Park-as close as you can to your destination then lock all doors. Choose well lit areas. And sad to say, avoid strangers.
3. Focus-stay off your smart phone. Don’t get distracted. Text or talk when you get in your locked car.
4. Lock-your car and once inside your car don’t let your guard down-lock all your doors and be wary.
5. Purse-keep it under your arm.
6. Keys-have them out and ready. They work as a weapon too.
7. Buddy up-to your car. Go with others even if you have to ask for an escort. Don’t let pride get in the way. Better safe than sorry.
8. Carry-some self-defense products like stun guns, pepper sprays and personal alarms. This SabreRed Spray is a very potent self-defense tool with one of the fastest growing and most compact keychain defensive sprays available. It has approximately 8 shots of up to 8 feet away using a cone spray pattern so it may hit more than one person at a time.
9. Common sense-usually prevails. Use your head.
10. Trouble-if you get in trouble, make as much noise as you can-scream, use your alarm, use the panic button on your key fob-all to draw attention to your predicament.

For more information on this topic read our article on How To Avoid A Parking Lot Assault that may shed more light on the topic.

Perhaps the best tip you can get is to pay attention and not be distracted. Use these tips when you go shopping and you’ll be way ahead of the game.

It is easy to become engaged in something else and not be aware of your surroundings. Especially with children, the possibilities of harm seem to grow the further away you are from the store. Please make your holidays memorable for the right reasons and not because you became a robbery victim.