Anyone who’s ever needed something locked behind a glass door (or some other security measure that makes it hard to just grab an item off the shelf) knows the drill. You try to click the button to call an employee, wait for an employee to show up, hope the employee isn’t busy with someone else first, and maybe even leave without your item because you’re tired of waiting or just frustrated at the friction of the shopping experience.

One Tennessee electrician went to grab wire for a job and expected the usual wait. Instead, he found Lowe’s had quietly changed the system to seemingly give customers more autonomy in the store.

Lowe’s Gets a Security Upgrade

In a trending video with more than 55,000 views, content creator and contractor Tim, of Tri Cities Electric (@tricities.electric), stopped at a Lowe’s in Tennessee to pick up some wiring for a job. 

“One of my least favorite things about coming to Lowe’s was that I’ve obviously got to buy wire, and they keep it behind these cages,” he says, showing what look like wire doors on the retailer’s shelves.

This time, though, there was a touchscreen mounted right on the metal doors, so Tim tried it out.

“We simply click ‘use your cell phone,’ agree to whatever that is, put your phone number in,” he said.

A code landed on his phone seconds later, and he typed it back into the screen.

The screen accepted it, and two electromagnets holding the cage shut released on their own. No waiting for an associate required.

“Case is now unlocked. Got two electromagnets up here; they release. Now, I have all the access in the world to this. How neat. Good job, Lowe’s,” he said. 

“No need to wait for wire at @Lowe’s anymore!” he wrote in the caption.

Why Stores Are Locking Everything

The National Retail Federation says that retail theft costs the industry about $95 billion across sectors, and stores have responded by locking down anything with resale value, Business Insider reported. 

Visits by an Insider reporter to Walmart, Target, and Home Depot found the same pattern everywhere: power tools sealed in cages, spider-wrap alarms clipped onto smaller items, and security cameras trained on entire aisles. 

Lowe’s specifically has cages on power tools, alarms on display units, and—as of last year—some tools that won’t even power on until they’re activated at checkout. 

Retail Theft: Is It That Bad?

The “retail theft crisis” narrative is a lot messier than it sounds. Retail executives spent a solid year sounding alarms about “shrink”—inventory loss from theft, employee error, and accounting mistakes combined—but by 2024, several major chains were quietly walking those claims back, according to NPR. 

Walgreens’ own finance chief admitted the company might have “cried too much” about theft the year before. And the industry’s go-to shrink figure, sourced from a National Retail Federation survey, has barely moved over the past decade—hovering around 1.4% to 1.6% of sales for years. 

That hasn’t stopped the security theater, though: Nearly a third of shoppers say locked-up products make them think worse of a store, and more than a quarter say it’s enough to make them walk out without buying anything.

‘Better Than Home Depot’

The comments filled up with a mix of impressions about the tech.

“So then what’s the point of the cage….” a top comment read.

“Bout time because finding one of them associates isn’t easy,” a person said.

“Until someone leaves it open….” another wrote.

“And now you will be all kinds of marketing text or in that permissions agreement you gave them access to your contacts and to install software,” a commenter added.

Motor1 reached out to Tim via email and Instagram direct message for comment. We’ll be sure to update this if he responds.