mornin' merry makers 🕵️‍♀️💰🛍️🔍🛡️

i met today’s guest at a founders dinner in austin hosted by vinyl vc & within five minutes, i was begging her to go on a walk so we could keep talking about retail.

since then, we’ve made several loops around town lake with our pups in tow, swapping stories about the weird & wonderful world of retail, returns, & fraud.

meet alex shamir, co-founder of yofi.

she’s an expert in a part of retail that doesn’t usually get much love: loss prevention. it’s a field that’s often outdated, underfunded, & misunderstood. but alex & the yofi team are changing that with behavioral science, sharp strategy, & a surprisingly playful mascot, a raccoon!

yofi, like their mascot, is on a mission to dig through the mess & expose the “trash” left by fraudsters. this helps retailers protect profits while elevating the experience for the legit customers with good intention.

bc the truth yofi realized is that fraud prevention isn’t separate from customer experience, it is customer experience.

when you know who’s trying to game the system,
you can better serve the people who truly love your brand.

bts q&a: alex shamir

Q1: can you share a little bit about you and the work that you do?

Howdy, y’all! I’m Alex Shamir, co-founder at Yofi! 

My journey has been all about blending data analysis, technology, and business to solve tough challenges. After diving into the world of “friendly fraud” and abuse, I realized that businesses needed more than just fraud prevention-they needed a way to understand customer intentions. That’s when we decided to focus on return fraud and abuse, and it led me to co-found Yofi. 

We specialize in protecting businesses from bad actors while rewarding the good ones. It’s been an exciting ride, and I’m passionate about the impact we’re making in transforming the way companies approach returns and loyalty!

Q2: your journey to founding yofi went from phd student in chemistry to working at nike & apple focused on retail fraud prevention. what sparked your interest in this area?

I don’t think anyone wakes up and says, "I want to work in fraud!" It kind of finds you, right?

Back in the 2019-2020 hype sneaker days, I was looking at data that was more confusing than a mystery novel. That’s when the "Aha!" moment hit-while we had all this data, it was a complete mess, and I had to dive deeper to make it work. 

Honestly, it's just like chemistry-turning chaos into something useful, but with a lot more sneakers involved!

Q3: what inspired you & your brother to build yofi? what’s it like building a company with your brother as your co-founder?!

What inspired me and my brother to build Yofi was the combination of our unique skills and experiences. 

Jordan is the perfect complement to my personality and skillset, just like our other co-founder, Andrii. Andrii and I worked on similar problems at Nike, and both of us saw the same issues across other retailers. Jordan brought incredible experience from scaling companies at IBM, something I didn’t have.

Building a company with your brother is incredible-it’s a deeper bond, where you just get each other. Though, sorry mom, sometimes I view him more as a co-founder than a brother now,

Q4: return fraud is often an invisible problem for many retailers. can you help our readers understand the scale of the issue and its impact on retail businesses?

Return fraud is a massive, often invisible issue for retailers, affecting a wide range of products-from toothbrushes to underwear to electronics. 

We’ve seen that around 2% of bad actors are responsible for about 20% of abusive returns, which is a huge drain on business profits. Brands lose ~1% of total sales to return fraud alone! 

The scale of the problem is staggering, especially when you consider how it affects margins, inventory, and even customer trust. Retailers often don’t realize how much of their return activity is driven by fraud, and that’s where we come in—helping businesses identify and stop bad actors before they can cause significant damage. 

The impact is far-reaching, but with the right tools, it’s entirely preventable.

Q5: yofi identified $1.5b in return abuse in 2024 alone (super impressive!). what trends are you seeing in return fraud that retailers should be aware of?

Thank you! The $1.5B in return abuse we identified in 2024 is just the tip of the iceberg. 

One of the biggest trends we're seeing is the increasing impact on customer experience (CX). Bad actors are now making fake police reports and wasting valuable time from customer service agents who should be helping legitimate customers. 

Another trend is return fraud spreading to lesser-known items and smaller shops-think things like blankets or niche products. 

Also, the people who are reselling your items are often the same ones committing return fraud, creating a whole new layer of complexity for retailers. 

It’s more important than ever to be proactive in identifying and addressing these tactics before they spiral out of control.

Q6: how does return fraud differ between physical retail and e-commerce, and does this affect how retailers should approach prevention?

Return fraud in physical retail and e-commerce is actually more connected than most people think, which is why retailers need an omni-channel approach. 

The same bad actors who are stealing from your stores are often doing things like "buy online, return in store" with fake items or trying to manipulate store associates. It's a cyclical process-they steal, then return, and repeat. 

When you spot a bad actor online, chances are they’re also hitting your physical stores in the same way. That’s why preventing return fraud requires visibility across both channels, working together to identify and stop fraud before it spreads.

Q7: many retailers worry about balancing fraud prevention with customer experience. how does yofi help maintain that delicate balance?

At Yofi, we focus on rewarding the good while preventing the bad, striking a balance between fraud prevention and customer experience. 

It’s essential to filter out bad actors to maintain a profitable, positive customer journey. We use dynamic policies that adapt to individual behaviors, offering personalized experiences for legitimate customers.

Those who try to abuse policies are identified and blocked before they can cause damage. This allows retailers to foster strong relationships with customers without sacrificing security.

Q8: what's been your proudest moment in your journey with yofi so far?

My proudest moment at Yofi so far has to be detecting a bad actor who went to incredible lengths to commit return fraud. 

This person actually drove 100 miles, hitting different open houses to buy items, then returned them later, trying to exploit the return policies. It was almost impressive how dedicated they were to gaming the system! 

Catching that level of fraud really highlighted the power of what we’re doing at Yofi-seeing the lengths bad actors will go to, and knowing we’re one step ahead in stopping them.

Q9: what's next for yofi? any particular areas of expansion or new solutions you're excited about?

What's next for Yofi is exciting! 

We’re expanding with some amazing new partners (#TheHomieTechStack), which will help us bring even more innovative solutions to the table. 

We're also continuing to push forward with more intentionality detection, refining our ability to understand and predict customer behavior. 

There are some great things on the horizon as we continue to evolve and help retailers stay ahead of fraud while creating better customer experiences. Stay tuned for even more impact!

Q10: what’s one thing you wish more brands understood about return abuse & fraud?

One thing I wish more brands understood about return abuse and fraud is that credit card fraud detection doesn’t catch policy abuse or friendly fraud. You need to look beyond just the rules. A rule-based approach is only the tip of the iceberg-it’s not enough to rely on hardcoded rules to tackle this problem. 

True prevention comes from understanding the intent behind customer actions and leveraging data to spot bad actors, not just following preset rules. That’s where we come in, offering a more dynamic and proactive way to address the issue.

retail rapid-fire round

• fave retail store of all time? 

  • If Central Market doesn’t count, my fave is Backcountry!

• retail center that gets it right? 

  • Galeries Lafayette in Paris; Seamless experience between stores, brands, and different categories.

• can’t live without retail tool?

  • Happy Returns! I love their QR drop-off-it makes everything so much easier!

• retail metric you obsess over?

  • Return rates – It’s key to spotting fraud and ensuring profitability.

• your signature style of merrymaking? 

  • Birthday celebrations - I love gift-giving, and it is fun to celebrate with internal memes with the team!

• best retail advice you've ever received?

  • “Know your customers deeply” – It’s the foundation for everything.

• what do you love about working in retail? 

  • Selfishly, fraud moves quickly, so it’s always a race to keep up!

connect with alex & yofi

if today’s chat sparked any fraud-prevention aha moments, you’re going to want to keep tabs on yofi. alex & her team aren’t just stopping bad actors. they’re rewriting the script on return fraud by focusing on what good intent looks like.

because the truth is that return fraud isn’t just eating into your margins… it’s quietly ruining the customer experience, too. yofi’s giving it the attention (& glow up) it deserves!

highly recommend booking a demo to see the magic in action. 🔗 link up:

• learn more on their website

• follow yofi on linkedin

watching alex build yofi over the past two years has been such a joy. she keeps winning — new customers, pitch comps, & most importantly, solving a real pain point retailers often overlook with just the right amount of raccoon mischief 🦝

more to come from her & this team, i’m sure of it.