How To Improve Small Business Security and Protect Against Real-Life Threats

Small businesses of all types face many day-to-day security threats, and many business owners do not have adequate security measures in place to confront and mitigate these threats.

From burglary to storm damage, commercial security threats have the potential to cause devastating financial loss. So, make sure you know how to improve your small business security to protect your property and people.

What Are the Most Common Small Business Security Threats?

Forced entry and burglary

Forced entry and burglary are probably the most common small business security threat that people worry about, as they can affect businesses of any type, anywhere.

Commercial burglary involves the act of breaking and entering into a business with the goal of stealing valuable items. 

While some commercial burglars prefer to target specific types of businesses, such as high-end retail stores, many criminals don’t discriminate — they simply look for vulnerable businesses to target and take whatever they can get their hands on.

Smash-and-grab theft

Smash-and-grab theft is a type of retail theft in which the criminals have little to no regard for setting off alarms, making noise, or even being seen.

In reality, smash-and-grab thieves often target retailers during broad daylight with plenty of people around.

In a smash-and-grab theft, the perpetrators find businesses with expensive merchandise on display behind storefront windows or inside display cases to target. 

They then smash the glass protecting the merchandise using hammers or other heavy tools/objects, grab as many items as they can, and run off to an awaiting getaway vehicle.

In the past few years, we’ve seen an increase in organized smash-and-grab theft known as “flash mobs” or “flash robberies.” 

In a flash robbery, a large group of thieves (sometimes dozens) descends on an unsuspecting small business and shatters windows and display cases, making off with tens of thousands of dollars worth of goods.

They then split up, running in different directions to multiple getaway vehicles parked in various locations outside. So, even if one or two of the criminals get caught, many more of them get away.

Rioting and looting

If you’ve watched the news in the past few years, chances are you’ve seen at least one instance of civil unrest that has turned into violent rioting and looting.

Unfortunately, wherever there is civil unrest, there will always be criminals looking to use the chaos to hide their activities and get away with looting small businesses.

Not only can rioting and looting result in thieves clearing out your small business, they also typically cause tremendous amounts of damage to your property itself, resulting in even more devastating financial loss.

Storm damage

For small businesses in certain parts of the country, particularly in Florida and other southeastern states, man-made threats aren’t the only cause for concern — mother nature also poses a huge threat.

We’re talking specifically about hurricanes and strong windstorms, which both have the potential to send storm debris flying at high speeds into your business’s doors and windows.

If a piece of flying storm debris causes a glass door or window to break, it leaves your business exposed to further wind and water damage, which can destroy valuable equipment and merchandise and result in very expensive storm damage remediation and repairs.

Active threats/active shooters

We, unfortunately, live in a society where an active threat scenario can unfold anywhere, anytime.

An active threat scenario often involves an active shooter entering a place of business looking to harm those inside.

Even though many small businesses are open to the public, there are still steps you can take to reduce the risk of harm to those inside when an active threat is present nearby.

How To Harden Small Business Security Against Common Threats

If you look up small business security tips, you’re going to see lots of articles suggesting you do things like the following:

• Add security cameras
• Integrate access control
• Install monitored alarms
• Light up your business
• Update locks

These are all excellent tips, and are important components of any comprehensive small business security system.

However, there’s one thing security measures like alarms and cameras don’t do: create a physical barrier to protect vulnerable doors and windows against security threats.

An intruder or a piece of flying storm debris will make short work of unprotected window glass, which shatters incredibly easy upon impact. 

For the highest level of physical security for your small business, we highly recommend protecting glass doors and windows with retrofit polycarbonate security glazing.

How retrofit polycarbonate security glazing boosts small business security

Polycarbonate security glazing is the most robust type of security glazing out there. Because it doesn’t contain any glass components, it’s virtually unbreakable, even at non-ballistic levels.

Being a retrofit security solution, this glazing can be secured into or onto almost any existing framing system, so there’s no need to remove or replace the existing glass. 

Instead, the polycarbonate acts as an essentially invisible barrier over the existing glass, protecting it from all manner of impacts, whether man-made or caused by mother nature.

We recommend retrofitting polycarbonate over all vulnerable glass doors and windows that an intruder could potentially break to open a door from the inside or climb in through. 

Even the most determined forced entry attempts using sledgehammers or other heavy hand tools will be met with frustration, as the polycarbonate diffuses the force of the blows and bounces them off.

In fact, even if riddled with bullets, containment-grade (non-ballistic) polycarbonate won’t significantly diminish in strength or allow access.

This means that even entry-level polycarbonate security glazing can be used for access denial during active threat scenarios. But, if you want an even higher level of protection, polycarbonate glazing shields are available with very high levels of ballistic resistance.

In short, small businesses of any type can protect themselves against all the common threats above simply by retrofitting doors and windows with polycarbonate glazing, such as that from our ArmorPlast® line.

Contact us today for a free consultation.