YAKIMA -- Over the weekend, a group of teens walked into Coco's Mini Mart in Union Gap and stole cases of beer.

The owner says he's sharing what happened because the issue is bigger than just a couple cases of beer.

"I think the message that I want to give other businesses in town is that if you have shop lifters, do something about it," the owner said.

Captain Jay Seely says this type of thing isn't anything new for Yakima.

"Well we have seen a rash of that in the City of Yakima, and unfortunately, that seems to be a common occurrence amongst some teens. They're willing to go into the store and grab beer, make it what they call a beer run, and then they run out with the merchandise," Seely said.

Seely says police often find that it's gang members who are committing beer runs.

He says usually they will have someone distracting the cashier before they run out with the beer.

The charges for these thefts can quickly increase depending on if the person stealing gets physical.

"The concern is that usually it can turn from a simple theft to a robbery as soon as they use force on the clerk who may be trying to stop them from leaving the store with the stolen items," Seely said.

Coco's Mini Mart store owner says even if it's just a $10 case of beer, if other stores posted video or pictures on social media when people steal from them, it might help others identify the thieves if they target other stores.

"This way people who will think about shop lifting, they're aware that 'hey I don't want to be on Facebook, my family to see this'," the owner said.

Seely says convenience store crimes typically heighten around Christmas time, so police have started gathering store owners around then to teach them what to do and what not to do in certain situations.