Police Dept Shares Simple Tip To Keep Purses Safe During Holiday Shopping

It’s so easy you’ll wonder why you didn’t think of it

It’s the holiday shopping season and as you’re out buying gifts and hunting through the grocery store for everything needed to put on a righteous Christmas feast, you might not have the safety of your purse in mind.

Good thing a New Hampshire police department does.

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Plenty of women set their purses down in the seat of a shopping cart while browsing, but all it takes is stepping away for a few seconds, and your belongings are free to be taken by anyone passing through. Turns out there’s a pretty simple solution for keeping your bag safe, and though some of you may be aghast that any woman puts her purse in the cart in the first place, the fact is, lots of us are guilty of this habit.

Thankfully, the Windham, New Hampshire police department has a super easy way to keep your purse safe while it’s sitting in a shopping cart.

They write, “When using a shopping cart as you browse through the store, keep your purse zipped or closed and secure it to the cart by clipping the child safety belt through the strap(s). This will help in preventing someone from taking advantage of your distraction and running off with the purse.”

And in case the cart you’re using is devoid of straps? They have a fix for that too. “For those carts that don’t have the child strap, keep an inexpensive carabiner clip attached to your purse strap. Simply clip the carabiner to the cart and your purse is more secure.”

Even the most vigilant among us who regularly leave our purses in the cart seat have to turn around from time to time and abandon ship. In that brief moment, it’s possible a thief could make off with your goods, but a thief is NOT making off with your entire cart. Not without a fight and someone noticing, at least.

If you’re like me and prefer a tote-style purse that doesn’t really lend itself to hands-free shopping, this is a pretty amazing solution that costs nothing or close to it (those carabiner clips are a few bucks at most) so you can pick out a perfect onion at the grocery store without looking back every few seconds to make sure your purse is still there.

Last year, I was shaken from my little safety bubble when my purse (that I very stupidly left on the passenger seat of my car) was stolen while I was at the gym. Someone bashed my window in and took it. They were able to do that because I hadn’t ever given it much thought, and now, I’m realizing that I’m probably too lax in the cart seat purse department as well, so this tip is well-timed for me. Now, I can do something to keep my belongings a little safer without having an awful thing happen first to make me more aware.

Windham Police Department, bravo. Hopefully, this keeps a few women like me from dealing with purse burglary this holiday season.