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Comment by arsome | Hacker News Reader

A word of warning, I've frequently found Costco meats are far more expensive than at my local grocer, often on the order of 50-100% on sale items.

The design of the stores is also horrific, designed to make you maximize browsing time. Availability of products is piss poor too - one week you might find something you love, the next week you can't get it at all. I cancelled my membership after the first year because the main product I bought it for was no longer readily available.

Don't waste your money. Check your local flyers and cancel the expensive yearly memebership, it's just another way for big businesses to scam you.

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For me I find the average quality of stuff they sell at Costco is higher than other places. A nice warm weather resistant jacket was $35 this winter, I would have gotten something similar for $80 at a mall. The food is all good. I can pick something randomly I haven't tried before and I know it will be quality food. Compare this something like Walmart or Amazon where trying something new is like russian roulette.

I bought a high sierra "camelbak" type water pack for $25. I actually told someone I got it for a steal at $30 because I forgot what it cost. By the time my girlfriend went back they were gone - same thing at Amazon was over $40.

While I hate that you basically have to make an on-the-spot decision, they absolutely crush it on quality and price 9 times out of 10.

https://www.amazon.com/High-Sierra-Visalia-Hydration-Backpac...

http://www.costcoweekender.com/2016/03/high-sierra-visalia-9...

Or you can buy it from costco.com and have it delivered to your local store for free.

I tried out a Costco membership for a few weeks and finally got around to cancelling it last month. In general when I went looking for stuff I'd either find good prices on things I didn't want or average prices on things I did.

For example, coffee. The vast majority of what I saw on the shelf was ground coffee – for personal use bulk whole beans are a better value because they stay fresher longer. Most of it was also Seattle's Best / Starbucks / Peets, not terrible but particularly good either. Kitchen equipment – Costco has great prices on Le Creuset, but only has two sizes listed online (both oval). Laundry detergent, mostly heavily scented stuff, pass.

IMO discoverability is on par with Amazon (not a good thing) which discouraged me from spending more time than necessary in the warehouse.

They sell a ton of whole bean coffee. To the point that they have coffee grinders at the front of the store for people who want ground coffee. Not sure where you were looking.

They sell a ton of whole bean coffee. To the point that they have coffee grinders at the front of the store for people who want ground coffee. Not sure where you were looking.

I was looking on the shelves that were stocked with (ground) coffee. If there is a separate aisle for whole bean coffee I didn't bother looking for it -- I dislike the unlabeled aisles and don't want to wander through a huge warehouse looking for a needle in a haystack.

Granted I only skimmed the brands I knew I wasn't interested in (e.g. Starbucks) so there may have been some whole bean coffee on the shelves that I wouldn't have bought in the first place. I definitely haven't seen customer use coffee grinders though. It could also come down to differences in what the warehouses stock, but I'm not going to drive all over the Bay Area to find a Costco with whole bean coffee.

At my local Costco there is like an entire aisle dedicated to coffee/tea. Not sure what other stores are like. At least at my store, things are pretty logically laid out, usually doesn't feel like searching for a needle.

At least the two Costco’s I’ve shopped at recently sell massive bags of Kirkland brand whole bean coffee, usually with some sort of rainforest animal on the bag label.

Yeah coffee is one of the rare items I'd be a stickler for buying a specific brand name. I do remember seeing a bunch of K-cup inventory as well. Looking at Costco.com, they want around $15 for a two pound bag of Peets whatever. I can go to any of the grocery stores around here and pick up the same thing for the same price (or around $12 when they rotate it through a sale price which Safeway seems to do regularly). Looking at Costco.com the Kirkland stuff is cheaper (no way to filter by whole bean / ground though).

I just though of something else about the dutch ovens. Costo.com also lists a Lodge enameled dutch oven for $58. It's the shape (round) I was looking for and about the right size. I passed because I was looking for a made in not-PRC one. Amazon carries the same Lodge one for only wants $60 though. I ended up with the Williams-Sonoma house brand one (made in France by Staub) for less than Costco wanted for their similarly sized Le Creuset one.

I've heard good things about the print lab, pharmacy, and optometrists but have never used them. The Costco prices on vaccines compare favorably to the normal prices of the city/county run SF clinic, but not by a whole lot. The state of California subsidizes some vaccines for low income folks though. At $26 those are cheaper than what Costco charges (except for the flu vaccine).

https://www.sfcdcp.org/aitc/aitc-regular-prices-low-cost-or-...

https://www.costco.com/Pharmacy/adult-immunization-program.h...

The price/value proposition just wasn't there for me.

> Yeah coffee is one of the rare items I'd be a stickler for buying a specific brand name.

And that’s not really how Costco works. I don’t buy coffee there either, to be fair.

And that’s not really how Costco works. I don’t buy coffee there either, to be fair.

Yep. However I went in looking for coffee that Costco does stock (Peet's Holiday Blend) and only saw it pre-ground. I looked around for other roasts that grocery stores sell as whole bean in 2 lb packages (e.g. french, espresso, or italian) and only saw pre-ground on the shelf. The prices were on par with what Safeway charges off-sale.

Even for other items where I largely don't care about a specific brand the quality or price wasn't worth maintaining a membership.

This couldn't be more wrong. Costco sells excellent quality meat at great prices.

e.g. Costco sells prime-grade brisket for ~$4/lb. where I live. You generally can't even find prime brisket at an average grocery store, and the choice-grade will routinely run $7/lb or more.

I do compare for the same grades of meat, perhaps it's a US vs Canada difference, but I've found this to consistently be the case.

>designed to make you maximize browsing time

Have you never been to an IKEA? If you want to see what maximizing browsing time looks like IRL, you should visit one some time.

For Ikea, simply open website, find product, look at aisle number, walk to aisle in warehouse. Done. They also have a consistent selection of products available. If you've done the tour in the past year, chances are you already know the product you're looking for and chances are they'll have it in stock.

Ikea actually minimizes it if you know what you're looking for. Try doing that at Costco where they re-arrange the store just to make you have to look at things you didn't intend on buying. This practice has been the subject of many articles even:

https://www.businessinsider.com/costco-store-layout-how-to-g...

https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/09/25/443519599/epis...

Surely, you're joking?! What if you want to actually see the Flugelfluffer assembled before you purchase it in a flatpack? (maybe you want the white one? no, wait, the natural one) That entails going upstairs and walking around the whole circuitous path through every staged bedroom, dining room, kitchen, living room and bathroom just to find the damn Fluggelfluffer. Which is downstairs. In aisle 47C.

If Costco has the piece of furniture, its either in the middle display area or on the furniture aisle. That's it.

Ok,

1) Are you comparing equivalent quality meats? It's easy to find crap quality meat near its expiration date for cheaper than Costco deli price. It's pretty hard to find equivalent high quality fresh meat at the same price point without a bunch of coupons or random sales.

2) I'm not sure why you think the store design is horrific. Maybe it's particular to your local Costco, but I've been to at least 15 locations and they're all laid out pretty neutrally with logical aisles and departments. If you know what you want, you can go straight to it as quickly as you can navigate oblivious people pushing their carts at grandma-with-a-walker pace.

3) You're right - items do go in and out of stock because of the whole Costco business model. They arrange for preferential pricing on a contractual basis to get members deals they won't find elsewhere. Sometimes the supplier decides not to renew the contract or Costco decides the shelf space is better used for something else. That's just how it works. If you find a product you like, you can always order it in bulk online when Costco doesn't have it anymore. If you're only going to Costco for one or two items you like, the membership isn't for you.

With beef, it is more expensive. But that's because the quality is so much better. Get a steak from Costco and one from a chain supermarket, grill them and compare the taste. No comparison, Costco wins.

I own a BBQ business and CostCo in my area often has meat less than my wholesale cost from various restaurant suppliers. I can often get Prime briskets from costco for less than Choice from other suppliers. The same is true for some other items as well (foil pans are cheaper at Costco than restaurant supply store for example)

FWIW, Costco only sells high quality meat. Most of their beef is USDA Choice or Prime.

Costco sells USDA Prime? That’s worth the trip alone. Most grocery stores never have Prime.

Yes but stick to the larger sized vacuum sealed packs (10-15 lbs). The pre cut steaks are all blade tenderized so you need to cook them to ground beef temperatures.

The large packs are also $1-2 cheaper and you can split and freeze them yourself if you’re not a total carnivore.

>The pre cut steaks are all blade tenderized

I'm not sure that's accurate. Some of them definitely are but I believe the filet's (for instance) are not. I guess I'll have to double check next time I'm there.

> The pre cut steaks are all blade tenderized so you need to cook them to ground beef temperatures.

Eh, all those recommendations are very conservative. I've been eating undercooked ground beef my entire life (it tastes better.) If it's ever made me sick, it wasn't sick enough to notice.

Ya that’s very annoying. But if you have a sous vide you can pasteurize it at > 130F for 2.5-3 hours.

Blade tenderizing Prime beef is terrible and I hate that Costco does it (check the label before you buy), but my understanding is that if you cook via Sous Vide you don't need to take it to 160 degrees. You can cook it at a lower temperature (135/140) for a longer time and still kill harmful bacteria.

https://www.amazingfoodmadeeasy.com/info/modernist-cooking-b...

If I'm wrong, please correct me!

Whenever I read threads like this, I wonder if there's more of an issue with bacteria in food in North America, or if people are just more fastidious about it?

The other option of course would be that it's just HN-style 'nerding out' on any topic, (which is great) but I see it on Reddit and cooking blogs/recipe sites too.

I think most people conceive of Costco as a place where you save by buying low quality groceries in bulk. But they really only sell high quality groceries. If you’re poor, you probably can’t afford to shop at Costco for anything other than non-food items.

I find them to be comparable if not slightly better than other grocery store non-sale prices. Those places have good weekly deals, but their everyday prices are meh, and why visit multiple stores when you can get it all done at once?

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