In the Grocery Store

[Frank Pratt]

There are a number of ways to get into Costco or Sam's Club to just look around. No friend required. Just tell them you want to go to the membership desk to sign up. Just go past the membership desk and into the store. In some states they have to let you in to use the pharmacy or buy liquor without a membership.

We have no Sam's Club, but to shop at Costco, you gotta have a membership. Even if you manage to sneak past the person checking at the entrance, you have to present your card at checkout. No card, no checkout.

[mike stenson]

We have no Sam's Club, but to shop at Costco, you gotta have a membership. Even if you manage to sneak past the person checking at the entrance, you have to present your card at checkout. No card, no checkout.

Yep, but if you're checking it out to see if you want to become a member.. You can browse, and perhaps graze a bit.

[Brian Elfert]

Well I'm still looking at prices online and I still do better a frys with my discounts. Brand names don't mean anything to me. I find store brands just as good in most cases. I have a Chest freezer, so I can take advantage of sales on meat and fish. So I guess for me a memberships is not the way to go.

The Costco online prices for groceries are higher than in store to account for the cost of delivery. I wish they had the in store pricing on the website like Sam's Club does. As I said before if you don't care about brand names and just want cheap food you can buy less expensive food elsewhere. Many generic grocery items are very good, but some thens in the brand names are much better.

[Alex Zeller]

Way back when I was working at a glass company when a very attractive young woman pulled into our parking lot. The owner's son said "what ever she's selling, we're buying". She was selling business memberships so a few of us got the business membership cards. Costco had almost nothing we would use at the business but it allowed the owner's wife to shop there tax free. I have no idea if the accountant for the company kept track of it but I know a lot of stuff was purchased without paying sales tax. Anyway the business card allowed for early access to avoid the rush of people. Years later my father got a membership which allowed for another person to also get one so now I had two memberships.

At some point they offered a Costco credit card which I got. Because it was in my name but my account was under my father's name it created problems so they just gave me my own account without charging me the fee (I think it was $30 back then). I never go anymore because they are over an hour away so any savings gets quickly ate up by the extra driving and the long lines. As for food, I doubt I saved much at all. Buying in bulk is fine but only if you can eat all the food. I threw out lots of food that I just couldn't eat quick enough. So then I shifted to only buying what I could eat and realized that I wasn't buying enough food there to justify it.

It is a fun place to shop. I remember seeing petit ladies trying to push/ pull three large carts heaping full through the checkout. It was rare to see anyone in the checkout line with a cart only half full. Back then it seemed like the average person was dropping at least $400 (mid 90s) at the register. If they could do something about the checkout lines I might think about going back. I do have friends who still shop there.

I always thought that if they were to offer a auto detailing service (clean the interior, wash the car, and full up the tank) while people shopped it would probably do well. Pull up in front of the store, hand them your keys, and once you are at the register paying they pull your car around. I can't remember the last time I spent less than an hour in the store. I bet plenty of people would drop $50 (plus the cost of the gas) to not have to walk a half mile to their car dragging a cart.

[Jim Becker]

Interestingly, a lot of the food products I buy at Costco are not really bulk quantity. What I get there are meat products (beef, pork, chicken) and while they are slightly larger packages than the regular market, I vacuum bag individual portions and freeze anyway. (and we have only the tiny freezer on the bottom of the fridge) I buy less of that these days, however. I also buy frozen fish that's already portioned, typically mahi-mahi and cod.. I generally do not buy product there, other than, perhaps, berries and occasionally a bunch of bananas or a package of apples. The produce is nice, but yes...the quantities are too large for us. It works for me but may not be for others.