‘The YouTube guide to shoplifting’

Last Saturday I returned to the Post Office for my first shift of 2021. I arrived to find a cone of Ferrero Rocher from the owner with a note wishing me a happy new year. I stashed it in my rucksack and started work.

Despite several newspapers warning of BREXIT CHAOS IN THE POST OFFICE, very little seemed to have changed. We have to fill in an extra form for parcels to Europe but it only takes about five seconds. I’d call that a small price to pay for full control of our bananas.

My shift ended and I decided to stop at Tesco on the way home. I bought myself a Belgian Bun (or a Freedom Bun as they are now called) and then headed for the clothing department.

I’d had my eye on a pair of jeans for a while but was yet to purchase them. As my namesake and financial expert Martin Lewis says, you should always sleep on a pair of jeans. I don’t think he means it literally. The zip would hurt your face. There was one pair left in my size and, spurred on by sugar and half a cherry, I decided to take the plunge.

I proceeded to the self-service checkout where I paid for my jeans and left the store. It was only when I got home that I discovered I hadn’t removed the security tag. Presumably I had set off the alarm on my way out but nobody had come after me. I suppose there’s no point at the moment. With everyone wearing face masks, they’d never make the charges stick anyway.

People must wear masks while inside stores. Photo: Ellie Pipe

I was reluctant to return to the store in case I set off the alarm on my way in and looked like a shoplifter who hadn’t grasped the basics. In the olden days, my only option would have been to wander the streets looking for an unsavoury character who could remove the tag in exchange for an unspecified favour at some point in the future.

Luckily, we live in the information age. While the internet may be bad news for public discourse, mental health, cartographers and Blockbuster, it is great for mastering highly specific practical tasks.

There’s a “How To” video for everything. Thanks to YouTube I can now sew on a button, clean a microwave, and change my duvet cover without having to climb inside it like it’s the horse carcass in The Revenant.

If I ever kill someone, I have no doubt that a kindly lady from Nebraska will show me how to dispose of the body. I typed in “how to remove a security tag” and dozens of options appeared.

Every video was presented by someone who was keen to prove that they weren’t a shoplifter. They went into suspicious levels of detail about how they’d come to possess a tagged item.

One lady made a point of zooming in on her receipt, while a man tried to appear trustworthy by including his children in the video. I didn’t buy it for a second. He probably stole them too.

There were several methods of tag removal, some more advanced than others. I opted for “The fork method” as it was the only one that didn’t require specialised equipment (I consider rubber bands and a screwdriver to be specialised). The fork method is exactly what it sounds like.

You jam a fork either side of the tag and then pry it off with brute force. The lady in the video gave a cheery warning that “some of the older tags are full of ink so you might get covered in ink”. I decided to risk it. The jeans were described as “ink blue” so I figured nobody would notice.

Martin Pilgrim attempted the fork method. Photo: Viva Frei

My attempt at the fork method was mostly successful. The tag came off with a satisfying pop and a merciful lack of ink. Unfortunately, a thin section remained clamped to the jeans. Losing patience I yanked it off by hand, leaving a small hole in the waistband. I suppose I’ll be glad of the ventilation come summer.

Feeling triumphant, I decided to celebrate with a Ferrero Rocher. I took the cone out of my rucksack and tried to open it. There was no obvious entry point.

The entire thing seemed to be encased in Perspex, as if the chocolates were worried about snipers. Perhaps  all the time spent in the company of diplomats has made them paranoid. I tried in vain for several minutes before giving up.

My laptop was still open to the security tag video. I deleted “remove a security tag” and typed “open a Ferrero Rocher cone”. I soon discovered that some problems are too tough even for YouTube. The only video was of a lady attempting to open a cone in 2012 and then breaking down in tears. I expect that she’s still trying.

In desperation, I turned to the rest of the internet. I found a Mumsnet thread on the subject, but nobody was able to solve the problem. Some of the posts said things like “ended up smashing it with a hammer. I guess I’ll have to eat them all at once. Teehee”. I didn’t want to be greedy like a cheeky mum so I decided against the hammer method.

Martin Pilgrim found Ferrero Rocher a bigger challenge than a security tag. Photo: @saturnbattery

Eventually, after much swearing, I managed to puncture the coating with one of the forks from my earlier triumph. The case shattered into jagged shards that might as well have been glass. I swept them up and then unwrapped my prize. Removing the security tag had taken me three minutes. Opening the Ferrero Rocher cone had taken me fifteen.

I realised that I should have filmed it and become a YouTube sensation. Sighing at the missed opportunity, I ate another chocolate and watched “how to remove shards of plastic from your hands”.

Stand-up comedian Martin Pilgrim is a Bristol24/7 columnist.

Main photo: @saturnbattery

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