MANAGERS at Co-op food stores do not believe they are being targeted, despite a string of burglaries across East Surrey.
In less than two years, Co-ops in the area have been raided at least 12 times – including two break-ins in one month at the Smallfield store which have cost the company more than £5,000 in lost merchandise.
The most recent was at the company's Oxted store on March 24, when raiders made off with £4,500 worth of cigarettes after using boulders to break through the shop front.
But Co-op's head office denied the local convenience stores were being targeted.
Pamela Wood, spokesman for the Co-operative, said: "These incidents took place over more than 18 months.
"We always review our security after each incident of this kind.
"We would not link these incidents and we have no reason to believe we are being targeted."
Since July 2011 at least seven stores have been targeted, often with raiders making off with cigarettes.
On March 15, thieves broke into the Smallfield Co-op food store through the rear door and raided the cigarette counter making off with more than £3,000 worth of stock.
It followed a similar attack on February 15, when a trio of raiders broke in through the front of the Redehall Road shop in the early hours of the morning and stole a quantity of cigarettes. Metal shutters were installed across the shop front following the initial raid and on every other entrance following last month's attack. The store also has CCTV.
Supervisor Muzza Zawahir told the Mirror: "In the first attack they were here for four minutes, this time they were here eight minutes. I don't know why they pick us. We have shutters on every door now. Our staff are going on as normal."
The latest raid was the fourth time the Smallfield store has been hit, an unhappy figure it shares with the Bookham branch, which was last burgled in July 2011.
On that occasion two men broke a rear window and then stole around £2,000 worth of cigarettes from the High Street store.
In March 2012, Surrey Police linked a theft of cigarettes at Tadworth's One Stop shop in Cross Road with an attack on Epsom's Co-op store the night before.
Officers declined to say if they thought the raids were linked.
