Shopdropping

//ˈʃɒpˌdɹɒpɪŋ// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The covert placing of items in retail stores as a form of advertising, countercultural performance art, protest, etc. often, uncountable

    "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."

Example

More examples

"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."

Etymology

From shop + dropping, modelled on shoplifting.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.