Total shrinkage, which also includes losses caused by internal error, accounted for nearly 2% of sales in small food and grocery stores in the year to June.
While they were among the most targeted format, supermarkets were only the 10th in the Europe-wide survey of more than 500 retailers and 60,000 stores.
The data was not broken down by format, but overall retail theft figures for the UK showed more than £4.4bn of goods were stolen in the year to June, equivalent to 1.3% of all sales. Although a decline of almost 6% on last year's figure, when retail theft soared, it is still higher than the £3.7bn lost in 2008.
Perhaps most worrying for UK retailers is the finding that more than a third (36.8%) of all theft over the past year was carried out by employees, significantly higher than the European average of 29.8%. Slightly more retail theft in the UK, 42.7%, was committed by shoplifters.
Internal error accounted for 17% of retail shrinkage in the UK, while supply chain losses made up the remaining 3.5%.
"Even with the decline in retail theft, crime put an extra £180 on the average family's yearly shopping bill," said Professor Joshua Bamfield, director of the Centre for Retail Research.
The British Retail Consortium disputed the findings, but a spokesman said: "Retail crime needs to be taken seriously."
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