Celebrating its 40th birthday this coming year, Inter Chalet has successfully expanded its customer offering from a traditional builders merchant, selling timber, plate material, scrap metal and building materials to become Home Park Inter Chalet, a Do It Yourself supermarket for the home and garden.

Now eight stores, including seven partner stores, are combined in to one, offering everything from complete kitchens to plants and pottery. No boring shelves full of products, but playful presentations to inspire home improvers.
The 30,000m2 retailer, faces a challenge in protecting against theft in store.

"As a retail organisation, we had to deal with a lot of theft from both our customers and our employees," explains Hans Janssen, Financial Manager at Inter Chalet. "For some years we researched security possibilities that could help us decrease the level of theft.

"We eventually contacted Checkpoint Meto, an organisation that provides security cameras and after a few sessions with them, we were convinced about the quality of the i-PRO products, so we went for it. We haven't regretted our decision."

Inter Chalet utilises i-PRO's full range of video surveillance systems, including the 360-degree surveillance cameras, to provide a better view of the store and avoid blind spots whilst reducing the number of cameras required.

Various outdoor cameras are also installed in the surrounding parking area. At the entrance of the shop, there is a camera system together with a security screen to monitor those entering the premises, with various indoor cameras further throughout the store that help prevent shop-lifting, all of which are either 4K or Full HD ensuring excellent image quality throughout the store.

In addition, cameras installed with POS integration help prevent the store from fraud. This is achieved by linking the POS data with the camera image. It means that the store is able to check video footage relating to the receipt, if there is a concern over any potentially fraudulent transactions.

"We've spent many years working with i-PRO, and we're happy about the quality and performance of its products," says Hans Janssen. "We are also very happy about the service from both i-PRO and its partners in Holland."

"The security systems have more than halved our levels of theft from approximately 7% to just 3%.This has been achieved by not only catching shoplifters, but also by making people aware that we have an advanced security system in place," says Hans Janssen.