Teresa Ging says the vandalism and thefts she has experienced at her bakery, Sugar Bliss, in Chicago have become unrelenting.
A Chicago bakery owner is speaking out after experiencing an unrelenting barrage of vandalism and theft at her small business.
“We’re just sitting here waiting for the next crime to happen,” Teresa Ging, owner of Sugar Bliss, told Inside Edition. “I've come to the point that I’m numb to this; (thinking to myself) ‘are they (people who enter the store) coming to buy a cupcake or steal?’”
About once a month Ging says she deals with criminals at her bakery. Just last week, a man trashed her counter and tried to snatch a customer’s purse on his way out of the bakery.
“It was a very bold move at 10:20 in the morning on a Friday, with people in the store,” she said. She and two other women managed to get the purse out of the man’s hands before he ran off. It took police 40 minutes to respond to the store, and by that point the suspect was long gone, Ging said.
In another incident, a thief snatched a phone out of a customer’s hand. Surveillance video of the incident showed the suspect open the bakery door to quickly grab the phone and flee.
Ging said she’s determined it’s up to her to protect herself, her business and her customers.
“We're looking at self-defense classes, maybe even having a 24-hour security guard patrolling this block,” Ging told Inside Edition.
Ging said she’s considering moving her small business out of Chicago. “Sugar Bliss has been providing sweets in the Downtown Loop since 2009,” her website reads.
