Student Thieves Take DéCafé Baskets, Flair by Peter Dybdahl Patrons of the DéCafé can expect to carry their groceries by the armful as they shop in the coming weeks, as student-thieves have stolen 10 of the delicatessen’s 12 wire shopping baskets. The two remaining wire baskets will stay in circulation, though with dubious longevity. “Over the past week [the baskets] have been disappearing one by one,” DéCafé manager Brian McHugh said. All 12 of the baskets were in circulation in January, but after an inventory performed a week and a half ago, there were only eight. The number has declined rapidly since then, with only four or five baskets left last Sunday, and a count of two on Wednesday. DéCafé cashier Enola Bowen blamed the disappearance of the baskets on customer thoughtlessness. “Sometimes [students] buy too much and walk home with a basket. Then they’ll find some use for it there,” Bowen said. “They want groceries, they want to carry them, but they take the baskets and they won’t bring them back.” “The long and the short [is that],” McHugh said, “We want them back....We’re not trying to prosecute. You could probably think of some covert way to return them.” McHugh suggested the baskets could be left in the Rathskellar or a hall in Wilder. Since arriving in November, the wire shopping baskets were a stylish shopping accessory to the remodeled DéCafé, replacing the red and green plastic baskets of previous years. The set of one dozen wire baskets is valued at $199.99. The disappearance of the baskets does not signal an increase in shoplifting at the DéCafé, according to McHugh. “We have not really seen any problem with theft,” he said. Under current policy, the DéCafé’s policy is not punitive, but urges offenders to pay. The basket thefts do not appear to be connected to the January disappearance of a four-slice toaster from Dascomb.

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