"No matter how small you think it is, even if it's the avocado and you're saving $2, it's still shoplifting," detective superintendent Murray Chapman said.
Over 22,000 cases of shoplifting was reported last financial year.
Shoplifting costs the Australian retail industry $4.5 billion a year, according to National Retailers Association chief executive Dominique Lamb.
"There has been a normalisation of theft at self-service checkouts," Coles spokesman Martine Alpins.
"There's also a feeling that 'I'm not being served by a traditional checkout person, perhaps I have an entitlement'."
