Onekawa's Wycliffe St shop owners may have to resort to roller doors and plywood sheets permanently to protect their shopfronts from vandals.
Heinz Galler, who owns wholesale bakery Grains of Europe, said he could not afford to fix his shop windows because of his high insurance excess.
"I will be down $800,
that's 1000 loaves I would need to sell."
He plans to keep his plywood frontage up until next winter when he will build a new shopfront.
"It's no good me doing it up and it will be the same in a few days," he said.
"All it needs to break is a good kick."
He said his business operated from 2am which was a deterrent, but vandalism and graffiti were an ongoing problem.
"The phone booth has been damaged at least eight times in four years - the guy who looks after it said if it gets broken one more time it gets taken away."
The owner of the block of shops, Joanne Hellen, had operated the dairy next door for 17 years and was unconcerned about Mr Galler's plywood frontage.
"I think the plywood has been quite a good idea because since its gone up he hasn't had any more problems," she said.
Napier City Council were doing a good job of regularly painting over graffiti on her shops at no charge, Mrs Hellen said.
But Mr Heinz wants the council to provide security cameras.
"If it's good enough for the Napier shops it's good enough for us," he said.
"We try to make a few dollars then a few idiots spoil everything"
Mrs Hellen ran security cameras in her shop and had not considered a camera outside to protect her tenants.
She said cameras were troublesome because of the time taken to review them and her business had no issues.
"We've been quite fortunate because it's been really good security at the dairy because of the roller door," she said.
Hairdresser Sambath Samontry has taken to gluing vinyl to her regularly broken shop window to reinforce it, but also saw no point in video cameras.
"Even if you catch the people and take them to court they've got no money to pay back - I have to pay for the window," she said.
She said she had five years left to run on her lease and would try to tough it out.
