The assignment
A fire in a retail unit damaged the sales floor, the back-of-house storage and the fixtures throughout. Much of the stock was visually intact. US Claims Solutions was engaged to inventory contents and stock and to determine what could be recovered.
What made it difficult
Smoke-exposed retail stock is the hardest category on a retail claim, because it looks saleable and frequently is not. Packaged goods absorb odour through the packaging; food and health and beauty product that has left controlled conditions generally cannot re-enter the original channel regardless of appearance; and the decision is a compliance question rather than a condition one.
What was recorded
Stock was counted by department and quantity, with the exposure recorded per area rather than applied across the floor. Refrigeration, shelving, displays, signage and point-of-sale hardware were inventoried by manufacturer and model. Product that could not be released for resale on regulatory grounds was documented separately from product that was simply damaged.
Outcome
Stock that could be released went to secondary-channel buyers who handle that commodity. Stock that could not was documented for destruction rather than written down and quietly disposed of, so the file shows why no recovery was taken on those lines. The fixtures and refrigeration were valued against current equivalents rather than discontinued originals.