Retailers have been faced with increases in shoplifting and retail theft. But anti-theft prevention can hurt retail sales, says the CEO of Walgreens.

Over the years the pharmacy chain used strategy to combat shoplifting. Walgreens CEO Tim Wentworth said the company’s decision to lock up products after reporting a 52% increase in stolen inventory has backfired, according to multiple reports.

Walgreens’ plan to combat increasing theft by locking products up at their stores has hurt sales, the company’s CEO said in a recent earnings call.

Walgreens’ strategy of locking up merchandise — from deodorants to bags of M&M’s — to deter theft has backfired, according to CEO Tim Wentworth. “It is a hand-to-hand combat battle still, unfortunately,

Consider it a simple economic truth, one that ordinary Americans evidently knew long before CEOs: "When you lock things up ... you don't sell as many of them." So declares Walgreens CEO Tim Wentworth,