By Melody Hanatani
Daily Press Staff Writer

CITYWIDE — When the Vons supermarket on Wilshire Boulevard celebrated its grand opening earlier this year, the store purchased 250 new shopping carts. Within three months, the carts were gone.

Over at Ralphs, 1644 Cloverfield Boulevard, an average of 10 shopping carts went missing every day.

That is, until about two months ago.

Both supermarkets have enjoyed a dramatic decline in stolen cart incidents since installing a high-tech, anti-theft locking device that activates a brake in the cart’s wheel once it reaches the store’s parking lot perimeters.

Just think of it as an electric fence for wayward shoppers.

“The problem is less than it used to be before we used the device,” said Ralphs Manager Alberto Maldonado.

Since this summer, the new carts at Vons have come equipped with Gatekeeper System’s GS2 locking device, which automatically activates a brake in one of the four wheels in the cart once it hits a precision boundary that is defined by cables embedded inside the parking lot surface.

The carts can be unlocked with a remote control cart key.

“Everyone can install these, from 99 Cents Only Stores to Wal-Mart and Target to Vons to Cost Plus World Market,” said Renice Stewart, of Gatekeeper Systems.

According to Gatekeeper, an average shopping cart that lacks the anti-theft system can cost anywhere from $75 to $100. Retailers nationwide lose more than $200 million in shopping cart thefts every year.

In Santa Monica, the police department has recovered 63 shopping carts just since Aug. 1.

Stewart said the GS2 wheel blends in with the wheel and is not easily noticeable.

“Anyone who is not taking anything wouldn’t even know it’s there,” she said.

According to Stewart, the cost to implement such a system can run anywhere from $5,000 to $60,000, depending on the number of carts, the size of the secured perimeter and the layout of the parking lot.

Santa Monica resident Marilyn Lewitt was pushing one of the anti-lock shopping carts at Vons on Friday afternoon. The loyal Vons shopper of 12 years said she has noticed other supermarkets have converted to the new carts.

“I don’t blame the market because people take them and then the prices go up,” she said. “It’s not an inconvenience.”