According to the FBI Crime Data Explorer, there were 5,117,249 property crime incidents between July 2024 and June 2025, an 11.5% decrease from the previous year. Yet, businesses across the nation continue to lose billions of dollars annually to external theft. Cargo theft alone surged in Q2 2025 with 884 reported incidents, representing a 13% increase from Q2 2024 and losses exceeding $128 million.
Securing commercial properties against these persistent criminal threats demands solutions that actually work. Security measures that fail result in mounting losses and operational disruptions. Businesses must evaluate security strategies to find the most reliable option.
This article provides a detailed comparison of security guards vs. robust fencing, examining the costs, reliability, and overall effectiveness of each to guide strategic security decisions.
The Vulnerabilities of Manned Guarding
Many businesses initially choose security guards for their visible presence and perceived control. Guards offer immediate human judgment of security situations and can handle various tasks beyond security. Their ability to interact with employees and customers creates a sense of personal safety. Additionally, guards can provide detailed incident reports and serve as witnesses in the event of crimes.
However, hiring security guards comes with substantial financial and operational risks that compound over time, ultimately undermining the protection businesses seek. The vulnerabilities of manned guarding include:
The High Cost of Human Capital
According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the average annual salary for a security guard in 2024 was $38,390, excluding overtime and emergency coverage. Overtime rates must legally reach at least 1.5 times the standard hourly wage, escalating during holiday periods or when covering absent personnel. Benefits packages, including health insurance, workers’ compensation, and retirement contributions, can add up to 40% of base salary costs.
The annual security guard turnover rate can range from 100% to 400%, which results in frequent, burdensome training expenses. Each new hire requires extensive onboarding, site-specific training, and certification processes. Administrative overhead for processing payroll, managing guard schedules, and ensuring compliance with labor laws also demands significant internal resources. These hidden costs strain operational budgets while delivering inconsistent protection.
The labor-based model ensures costs inevitably rise over time. Annual wage increases, expanding benefit requirements, and inflation create a continuously escalating expense with the same limited coverage.
Human Factor Risks and Limitations
Even the best guard service cannot overcome fundamental human limitations, such as:
- Fatigue: Fatigue typically sets in during long shifts, particularly when overnight criminal activity is at its peak.
- Distraction: Attention naturally wanes after hours of routine patrol, creating predictable vulnerability windows that experienced criminals exploit.
- Collusion: Guards can be compromised, facilitating internal theft and resulting in devastating losses and damage.
Security guards also struggle to respond quickly across large sites. Expansive commercial properties, distribution centers, and trucking yards present insurmountable coverage challenges. While one guard checks the north gate, the south perimeter remains unwatched. These unavoidable blind spots and coverage gaps create opportunities that organized theft rings exploit.
Human susceptibility to social engineering presents additional risks. Criminal organizations often employ sophisticated tactics, including bribery, threats, or the placement of confederates within security services.
Liability and Inconsistent Performance
With high churn, guards may receive minimal field experience before they put in their notice. This constant rotation destroys institutional knowledge about specific sites. New guards lack familiarity with typical patterns, regular visitors, and site-specific vulnerabilities. Each personnel change resets security effectiveness to baseline levels.
Inconsistent protocol enforcement becomes inevitable with frequent staff changes. Different guards interpret procedures differently, creating confusion among legitimate personnel and revealing exploitable patterns to observant criminals.
Liability exposure also increases with the use of guard services. Businesses face potential lawsuits from guard negligence, excessive force incidents, or discriminatory behavior. Workers’ compensation claims from injured guards add unpredictable costs. Insurance premiums may rise to cover these additional liability risks, further escalating the true cost of using security guards.
The Strategic Advantages of Electric Fencing
Electric fencing is a fundamental shift from reactive to proactive perimeter security. Rather than responding after breaches occur, electric fences prevent intrusions and stop criminals from accessing your property. When weighing security guards vs. electric fencing, consider the various ways electric fencing strengthens your protection, including:
Two Layers of Protection
An electric fence ensures protection by preventing access to your property in two ways:
- Deterrence: The imposing presence of an electric fence creates a powerful psychological deterrent. Warning signs communicate that this property is secured, preventing opportunistic criminal attempts.
- Delay: If a criminal attempts to tamper with the fence, it sends a safe but memorable 7,000-volt pulsed shock that stops them before they can breach your perimeter. This barrier buys time for an appropriate response while preventing an intruder from accessing your property.
Constant Reliability
Electric fencing operates 24/7/365 without fatigue, distraction, or performance variation. The system maintains peak effectiveness during holidays or severe weather. When equipped for solar power, it defends your property even during grid outages. Unlike guards who require breaks, shift changes, and sick days, electric fences never stop working.
Electric fence systems utilize weather-resistant materials engineered for decades of reliable operation. Galvanized steel posts resist corrosion, while specialized insulators maintain electrical integrity through temperature extremes. This infrastructure investment provides protection that improves with technological advances rather than degrading with human turnover.
The fence provides consistent deterrence regardless of criminal sophistication. Whether facing opportunistic thieves or organized rings, the pulsed shock provides an immediate barrier. Criminals cannot use negotiation, deception, or intimidation tactics that might compromise human guards.
Long-Term Cost-Effectiveness and ROI
Electric fencing is an investment that keeps paying off and has minimal, predictable ongoing costs. Routine maintenance involves simple vegetation management and periodic system checks. With a security provider who offers security-as-a-service, you have no upfront costs and pay only a manageable monthly fee to enjoy regular maintenance. No salaries, benefits, or overtime expenses accumulate month over month.
With an electric fence, you experience return on your investment across multiple channels, including:
- Direct loss prevention from stopped theft attempts.
- Less frequent insurance claims due to theft prevention.
- Improved operational efficiency, as management doesn’t need to deal with guard-related issues.
Integration with Other Security Measures
Electric fencing is the foundation of a unified perimeter security system for your business. It integrates with other measures to create a comprehensive, multi-layered defense that addresses all threat vectors. These security measures include:
- Perimeter lighting: Alarm-based lighting systems are triggered when a criminal attempts to breach your perimeter, flooding the area with bright light. The sudden illumination disorients intruders while improving camera footage quality for investigators.
- Video surveillance: When integrated with electric fencing, video surveillance systems capture clear footage of intrusion attempts after the alarm is triggered, providing essential verification and evidence for prosecution.
- Access control measures: Gate Access Control systems manage entries and exits across your property to enhance perimeter integrity. Credential readers, intercoms, license plate recognition, and automated gates maintain security standards while facilitating authorized access.
- Remote monitoring: Remote and mobile monitoring solutions enable professional oversight without the need for on-site personnel. Monitoring teams receive instant notifications of fence alarms, allowing them to immediately access camera feeds to verify threats. The system also keeps records of attempts to tamper with the electric fence, which helps convict criminals.
Secure Your Property with AMAROK Electric Fencing
Comparing security guards vs. electric fencing reveals the clear advantages of electric fences for comprehensive 24/7 protection, consistent deterrence, and predictable costs. An integrated electric fencing system provides a proactive, reliable, and cost-effective solution that strengthens the perimeter and prevents crime before it occurs.
AMAROK provides the industry-leading electric fence solution for complete perimeter protection. The Electric Guard Dog™ Fence prevents 99% of external theft for customers after installation. Combining video surveillance, alarm-based lighting, and Gate Access Control, we create multi-layered security that deters even the most determined criminals. With operations across 49 states and over 8,000 protected customers, AMAROK delivers proven perimeter security solutions tailored to fit your needs.
Download AMAROK’s Customized Guard Review to learn more about the risk factors of using only security guards. Contact us today online for your free threat assessment. Download our free guide “7 Reasons Why Security Guards Aren’t Enough” to learn more.
