Costco

[VeloVT]

Do you have a membership, and do you think it's worth it? Why or why not?

I'm trying to decide if it would be worth the membership fee to join. The local warehouse is not extremely conveniently located (it's not close to anything else I go to), but it's actually a fairly quick drive.

[Chicken Little]

We are members, and would be members for the Rx glasses purchase alone- very much worth it. We also split large amounts of products with the neighbors. ( I don't have storage for 25 rolls of TP!). Also, keep in mind that they offer health care to all their employees, a living wage, profit sharing, and have a relatively low employee turn-over rate.

Also go a really good deal on car tires...

[Cataboo]

You can share a costco membership with 2 people. I share it with my mom, we get the executive membership that's $100 a year - but at the end of the year you get a 2% or so rebate on what you've spent... that usually ends up being about $75 or so for us.

I think it's worth it - I get prescriptions there, tires, food, etc. When you get tires there, they do nitrogen refills & free rotation, so every so often when i'm at costco - I give them the keys as I go in to do that. electronics are ocassionally a good deal. i get prescription glasses & sunglasses there... They have a selection of organic foods that are good prices for organic foods. A 5 lb bag of organic spinach for $5 is hard to beat. It does mean I'm eating lots of salads until it starts to go bad, then I make a big pot of spinach soup.

[sgtiger]

I'm a member at the executive level which has a higher membership fee but I get 2% back from most of my purchases at the end of the year. I end up getting all of my membership fee back with a little extra, so it pays for itself.

I get my glasses and contacts through them which is a huge savings over other places. My titanium frames alone would have been 3x the price anywhere else. Prescription medication seem to be less but our family doesn't get prescribed medication much so I can't be sure on that.

There are certain nonperishable items that I purchase in bulk. And I sometimes purchase snacks and frozen veggies that we go though quickly.

There isn't a huge savings on electronics. In fact sometimes they cost more at Costco, but their guarantee and customer service makes up for it. I find their electronics people are way more knowledgeable about their products than the specialty store people. If you're lucky, sometimes the company rep is there to answer questions on their products.

The other thing that is a factor for me is that it's a sort of a local company for us, and they carry a lot of items that are produced in Washington and Oregon. In fact their house brand is named after the town that they are based in and I used to live about 15 miles from there when I lived in Washington. I don't know if I'd buy from them so readily if I lived out of the area and everything they carried was from somewhere else.

[GLC1968]

We shop there fairly frequently. The best one in the area is across the street from where I work, so it's very convenient. When we lived in NC, it was a haul to get there, so we hardly ever went. The lines for their gas are always quite long but they move fairly quickly (I get it as cheap out in the country, but if you live in town, it's a deal).

We originally joined to get a great price on a carpet steam cleaner and we still use that thing!

Now, we mostly purchase bulk items (we have plenty of storage space) when we go. I did recently get a tip from a very knowlegeable friend that we should investigate Costco for flooring since we are in the market. Haven't compared prices just yet, though.

I like Costco. It's a pleasant place to shop (even when it's busy, they do a good job of keeping it sane), they carry the brands I like (in most things) and the prices are reasonable.

[Irulan]

Costco is how I fed my teenage boys without going broke. You do have to know your prices and just keep that in the back of your head. The in house brands for food are terrific quality.

I don't do much produce there, but I do get: fresh pastas, coffee beans, 6-8 packs of various canned good, specialty items like real paremsean cheese and sundried tomatoes, meats which I portion up and freeze, boxes of luna bars... I also get a lot supplements. The eye care at our local costco is excellent.

They had the best price on a CR Best Buy rated lawnmower that we wanted.

Note on flooring- this is one item I would be very careful about. We've done about 3000 ft-sq of hardwood laminate, and my professional installer friend who gave us tip warned us off of it, it's not that great.

[shootingstar]

We live only 1 block away from a Costco. I don't know what this store looks like inside since neither of us have even visited the store.

There's no real advantage for us to have a membership since we have limited storage space to store bulk toilet tissue and other non-perishable consumables/food. It's just buying for 2 of us.

And we are surrounded within several kms. of several different store chains for sales on fresh produce and household goods. Several national Canadian all-round grocery store chains, a national pharmacy chain store and 2 different specialized Asian grocery store chains with different choices --1 Chinese-based and the other, Japanese-based.

We are incredibly lucky to live in an area to have this level of choice with competitive pricing, plus smaller independents also with competitive pricing.

Now you know why I have no interest to live in the suburbs. Oh sorry, there is also an international Korean-based grocery chain store near us too. But I don't like their alot of selection..overprocesssed foods and more limited choice.

[Crankin]

I agree with Shootingstar. I have no reason to shop there; at one time we did belong to Price Club in AZ. I found I bought a whole lot of things I didn't need. We get our contacts very cheap on line and as far as glasses go, my head is so damn teeny that I have to go to a place that has a choice in upscale kid's glasses. My husband takes several prescriptions and gets them all on line, too. I only have one prescription that I go to the local, and I mean independent, pharmacy for. I like walking in and they address me by name and ask about my kids.
We have plenty of choice around here: 2 local grocery chains within 4 miles and another larger one 6 miles away. Trader Joe's and an excellent natural foods store are both within 3.5 miles. That's not counting the five local farms in Concord and the other ten or so in the surrounding towns.

[malkin]

Glasses, gas, coffee, Perrier, tomatoes, frozen blueberries, almonds & pecans, kleenex, generic allergy meds...

It's worth it for me.

Storing the TP in our little place is kind of a joke, though.

[sbctwin]

I like Costco, if, for nothing else, the gas price is at least 10c/gallon cheaper than anything closer. I live next door to a gas station! and Costco is near Petsmart! a weekly visit (for birdfood) and only 2 miles from the house. We don't buy much in bulk, but we do have a freezer in the garage and I like their frozen veges in the winter. You don't need to buy bulk to reap the savings, in my opinion. Maybe it is the convenience, but there are certian things my DH and I like that are way cheaper at Costco than we can buy at my favorite market, Harmons

[msincredible]

I used to be a Price Club member years ago and I wouldn't do it again.

[Tuckervill]

No Costco near me, here in Sam's Club's back yard. If there were one, I'd be a member, of both Sam's and Costco.

I buy organic milk at Sam's for about .50 cents a gallon less than Wal-Mart. Where I really make my membership money back, though, is on meat. (This may not be the case at Costco..) Sam's puts all their due-to-expire meat on clearance every morning. I have a business membership so I can go in at 8 a.m. Once a quarter or so, I go in and stock the freezer with very many expensive cuts of meat (yeah, in bulk, but we divide it before we freeze it) and we eat good meat for a long time. My husband likes to smoke meat so we always have something good to eat.

I used to buy Sam's gasoline, but since it has ethanol in it now, I refuse. I pay extra for the non-ethanol gas closer to Oklahoma. It is not cost-effective for me to go to Sam's for gas, anyway, but their prices are always lowest.

Karen

[roadie gal]

We had a membership for about 5 years and finally decided that it wasn't worth it for us. Neither one of us is on any meds and we don't have kids. They don't carry the pet food that I like. The only advantage would be my glasses. But it just wasn't worth it.

[Irulan]

What is your issue with ethanol gas? Up here, they only sell gas w/ethanol, during the winter months. There is no other option. They do it to improve air quality in winter, and that has certainly improved over the years. We don't find it affects our vehicle's performance, either, so what's the problem?

[Tri Girl]

Like Karen, we only have Sam's club here. I used to go to Costco when I lived on the east coast. I think I like them better.
We buy some things in bulk, but don't go there very often. I buy laundry soap, gum (we are big gum chewers), bisquick, toilet paper, slim fast, and a limited selection of canned goods. Most anything perishable goes bad before we have a chance to use it.
I still like to go there, though, as it saves me money overall- and it's not any further than my favorite grocery store.