Meanings
- oftenuncountableartThe covert placing of items in retail stores as a form of advertising, countercultural performance art, protest, etc.
This is the season of frenetic shopping, but for a devious few people it's also the season of spirited shopdropping. Otherwise known as reverse shoplifting, shopdropping involves surreptitiously putting things in stores, rather than illegally taking them out, and the motivations vary.
2007 December 24, Ian Urbina, “Anarchists in the aisles? Stores provide a stage”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 19 Apr 2023Synonyms: droplifting
Synonyms & antonyms
nounThe covert placing of items in retail stores as a form of advertising, countercultural performance art, protest, etc.
Origin
From shop + dropping, modelled on shoplifting.
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Finnish omien tavaroiden jättäminen kauppaan
- omien tavaroiden jättäminen kauppaancovert placing of items in retail stores as a form of advertising, countercultural performance art, protest, etc.
Cite this entry
shopdropping. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/shopdropping
“shopdropping.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/shopdropping. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “shopdropping,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/shopdropping.
Source: shopdropping on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.