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Costco fans thread

LizKat said:
So it's only Citi Visa? Or any Visa?

Sadly there's no Costco near here anyway, there's a BJ's in Oneonta that I've been to four times in 20 years. I was just curious about the card switch you mentioned. I thought Chase was really big on Visa; they switched their MasterCard accts to Visa awhile back, no?
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Any VISA card. The Costco card is great for expensive purchases, like a television, but it blows in other areas except gas. There are plenty of issued cards out there that provide near-same or the same rates or other types of rewards. They do have a quarterly limit, but I sincerely doubt anyone's dumping 7,000 in gas money each year.

I have a bank account with Chase and also their Sapphire card. To the best of my knowledge, they've always been VISA.

Suture said:
Yeah definitely not the best I've had, but damn good deal for the money. I miss the salsa they used to sell like 10 years ago. That stuff was amazing.
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They had a peach and habanero salsa a long time ago. They stopped carrying it and began carrying another brand. Santa Cruz something. They stopped carrying it again, I think. Not a savory salsa, but fine with chips. It compliments a cheap Mexican beer like Pacifico Clara nice. A huge step up from often skunked Corona Extra. But if you want to drink something nice and cheap and from Mexican, I'm inclined to say Bohemia or Negra Modelo. Or if you can find Corona Familiar in a 32 oz brown bottle. When I was younger, I'd go on long fishing expeditions with friends and that was the beer the locals would sell us gringos. It was cheaper than the clear bottles too. 12 oz. for 1.99 vs 32 oz for 2.99. And it tastes way better.

There's an alright salsa company called 505 Southwestern, IIRC. Decent stuff, nothing too special.
 
My very short story of how Costco and REI conspired against me:

Costco: You can only use Amex here. :rolleyes:
Me: Sigh, okay, I'll get an Amex even though I don't want yet another credit card. o_O

Costco: Haha, now you can't use that Amex here. :rolleyes:
Me: That kind of pisses me off, seeing as how I got that card just for you. o_O
Me: But it's fine because my REI credit card is VISA. I'll just use that, like I would have preferred in the first place. :D

REI: Oh by the way, your REI VISA is now an REI Mastercard. :p

Me: :mad:
 
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And I'd love to have been there, brisket sandwich in hand, watching a fellow customer unload onto management in a hilarious manner.
 
Larry-K said:
Saw it at Business Coscto, waiting for a whole frozen tuna.
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Business Costco? Online? I've never seen a physical one. I don't know where you live, but if you're on the sea boarder you can go down to the fishmongers in the early morning and grab that morning's catch. They do a brief flash freeze hours before to kill any bacteria.
 
Zenithal said:
Business Costco? Online? I've never seen a physical one. I don't know where you live, but if you're on the sea boarder you can go down to the fishmongers in the early morning and grab that morning's catch. They do a brief flash freeze hours before to kill any bacteria.
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There's one in Hawthorne and in Industry, so I have my choice. I think there's around eight or so in the Western U.S.

If you're ever near one, stop in, you never know what you'll find. I'm always tempted to buy a commercial slicer.

Did you find the Lamb at a regular Costco? I saw it in Hawthorne.

I'm sticking with a bowl of Costco Poke for now, but that's in Huntington Beach.
 
Larry-K said:
There's one in Hawthorne and in Industry, so I have my choice. I think there's around eight or so in the Western U.S.

If you're ever near one, stop in, you never know what you'll find. I'm always tempted to buy a commercial slicer.

Did you find the Lamb at a regular Costco? I saw it in Hawthorne.

I'm sticking with a bowl of Costco Poke for now, but that's in Huntington Beach.
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What's the membership limitation?

No, I didn't. I usually special order lamb parts or entire lambs through my butcher or another guy and have them cut up the frozen carcass for me into the specific parts and then stick them in my chest freezer. Or I'll buy a quart or half a lamb. The price is fantastic though, I can't argue with Costco over it. If they can cut it up into sections post purchase, I'd be even happier.
 
Zenithal said:
What's the membership limitation?

No, I didn't. I usually special order lamb parts or entire lambs through my butcher or another guy and have them cut up the frozen carcass for me into the specific parts and then stick them in my chest freezer. Or I'll buy a quart or half a lamb. The price is fantastic though, I can't argue with Costco over it. If they can cut it up into sections post purchase, I'd be even happier.
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I have a business membership, but I don't think it matters.

They have butchers there, don't know if they'll cut the lambs up or not.

Next time you're at Costco, check the literature on the way out, should be a Costco Business Catalog there.
 
The two Costcos closest to me typically have vacation package material on the right of the entrance with the 4K TVs on the left side. I'll have to look the next time I go. I'll look it up on Costco Business Delivery's site. I almost bought the Alera shelving the other day until I realized it was literally the same thing as the Style Selection stainless steel shelving available at Lowes. The stamping are the same as well. I bought two units for my garage in 2007 that are the same thing, albeit they cost me $60 a pop then. Costco seems to either do rebrands at times or sell the same product as other stores for a higher price.
 
Zenithal said:
The two Costcos closest to me typically have vacation package material on the right of the entrance with the 4K TVs on the left side.
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Look on the way out with the Air Conditioning guy, there's about 4 or 5 mags on various services, (could be mirror Costcos, but of the dozen I know, they're all pretty similar, Right goes in, left goes out) but the website has all the info as well.

We have them drop off drinks (darn, forgot the Mini Moos again), paper towels, yada, yada.

It's a fun trek, and if you need a hundred bunches of cilantro, you're covered.

There's an interesting article on the Costco Connoisseur blogspot about Business Costco (I think the guy photographed the entire place), One on Bloomberg about The AMEX debacle, and the heartening news that Costco is one of the world's largest pizza chains (could've guessed I suppose).
 
Larry-K said:
Cool, whatcha makin?

I saw the Himalayan salt finally, was tempted, but I use so little and I have a tendency to stock up on large containers I have no room for.
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Nothing for now. Mine was already prepped and packed, which was nice. They're in deep freeze now and I attached labels of the purchase data. I'll likely roll em out come the holidays. I spoke to much regular butcher and he said that I could bring in any large pieces to be cut on the house since I buy a lot from him or I could try it provided I had a new reciprocating and food grade blades laying around. I do have both, coincidentally, but I might have to replace the blades assuming they're only good for a few years before they "expire," if there's such a thing. If we were talking about whole frozen animal, I'd contemplate it, but everything's cut with precision.

You're going to have a tough time waiting for Costco to bring in frozen whole ahi or albacore. I believe they do but they make a poke with it and sell it. You could try Restaurant Depot. All you need a valid business license, doesn't matter if you're a restaurant or not. Forget about liquor though. Even if you had a liquor license, the prices in bulk aren't as good as ordering through a liquor/wine store and them passing the savings to you. There's the LA docks when they bring fish in the morning. They freeze on the boats before they get to shore so it's legal to sell.
 
Anything interesting? I'm waiting, patients and hopefully, for my local locations to stock a few specialty preserves but I'm not holding out for long. Wish I'd picked them up sooner in the year. My nearest one has changed item locations quite a bit, which has caused us to redo our aisle map so we can find stuff faster.
 
costCo seemed to stop selling several items i need. Not worth the drive
costCo dosnt like to wake up too early in the morning
costCo has strange credit cards

-dog food, i now buy on line at chewy.com
-soy milk, buy at the local Safeway, reliably on sale good price
-i got a local restaurant depot account for other items
-tires online at tirerack.com and they drop ship to my mechanic


these days, having to pay someone to shop at their store just seems not a good choice
 
Read recently that Costco sells things to their members at THEIR cost. They make their money solely on membership dues. That is their business model according to something I read recently.

That being said, I worked with a guy whose father-in-law spent his career as a meat salesman. He told me there really is a difference in the meat from different places. 5 and 4 star restaurants get their very best quality stuff (that is why a steak is so much more there than Safeway), and supermarkets get some of their lowest quality stuff. He then dropped the bomb on me that the other place that gets the best quality stuff was Costco.

I am not a Costco employee, nor do I know any, nor are there any in my family, either now or ever to my knowledge. However, I do remember when they bought out Pace Clubs and Price Clubs and I remember when they only took Discover Card. Then they only took AmEx. Now they only take Visa (right after REI switched to MasterCard), so I'm in the same boat as ActionableMango.
 
He'd be correct. There isn't much of a market for USDA prime outside larger retailers that buy enough to offset costs and butchers. If I want a particular cut in a particular way, I can call my butcher ahead of time or place an order at Costco, but the butcher will be faster. Kroger or Vons or WF may carry prime, but it's usually a small amount and put in the back for customers who ask. That said, I do advise people to learn their meat and be vigilant about meat other than the grade label. Sometimes you can get lucky finding what's obviously undergraded. I've gotten lucky several times at Costco and even your typical retailer when their head butcher either makes an honest mistake or doesn't know their meat grading well. One time years back, I cleared house at Costco because some shmuck misgraded a ton of USDA Prime Abundant with what I think was moderate Select. The price difference was several hundred.

My local Costco does a very good job at trimming silver skin and excess fat caps. I have to do very little extra trimming. They also have a very extensive seafood selection and fresher fish than most indy shops, even if I drove to the pier in the morning to buy fish by the box. We had some lovely wild salmon yesterday with delicious layers of fat in between flakes and the belly. Quite possibly the best salmon I've had apart from catching it myself.

Costco Business Delivery, which someone told me about in here, tends to supply restaurants and smaller stores. You can order as a regular consumer, too, or visit a business center, which is what I've done to buy general meat in bulk, like chicken. Organic or non-organic, grass fed beef, hybrid fed, or corn and hay fed, etc.

The only thing I don't like about Costco is their truck delivery dates; they're all over the place. With other stores, I can get truck delivery dates through a supervisor or manager. I hate wandering around only to find out they, Costco, are expecting a shipment of said product within the next few days.

Usually if I or we see a new product, albeit edible, we'll get it. We might find out we like it. Sometimes certain locations will drop a product for a while or several months because it didn't meet sales expectations at that location.
 
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Zenithal said:
... That said, I do advise people to learn their meat and be vigilant about meat other than the grade label. ...
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i discovered a costCo alternative; Restaurant Depot and would like to here your guys opinions on this retailer. No, I am not associated with either company.

either costCo or Restaurant Depot; your likely not to find all the items for the household so why even try.

Restaurant Depot seems to have a large meat selection?
 
Read several posts up. ;) Well familiar with them. Just requires a valid business license. They're alright, but at the end of the day, it still makes more sense and saves money to go direct to a company instead of a middleman for some stuff.
 
In this month's flyer, the good deals are:

2 pack Nutella if you're into that nasty stuff.
Big box of Mary's Gone Crackers, really tasty stuff.
Clorox Wipes, cheaper than a few months ago.
Clorox 2, big bottle. A step above their PE series.
84 oz Tide, not listed but they've got it on sale.
Suja pressed juices, very healthy, no added sugar, low sugar.
Bausch + Lomb Ocuvite 50+ and Areds 2
Nature's Bounty 5000 IU D3
Nature's Bounty B12, Sublingual, Methylcobalmine
Nature Made B12 1000 mcg, tablet - Not a good deal. Uses a poor form of B12, ignore their fish oil and their D3. The Magnesium is a good deal, though.
Dawn Platinum - Very good soap, uses various enzymes to break down fats and proteins, making washing up easier. 1/3 teaspoon will dissolve baked on crud from a pan in 30 minutes with cold water, gentle on hands.

I cannot find a single Costco in the general area that's still carrying the raspberryapricot preserves or the blueberry. I've been told it's set to come back after December. Bastards.
 
Their Kirkland brand dry dogfood, the lamb flavor, is one of the higher rated general dogfoods, as good as if not better than expensive vet brands. Our dog loved it.

They also used to have wonderful rolls of goat cheese in the deli section, very creamy.

They used to have Adams chunky peanut butter that was a great deal.

My nephew is a manager at the Foster City (I think) one, so I always hear great stories
 
The Redwood City Costco sells boxes of macarons from a bakery next door and they're delicious :) That's the only reason I've gone to Costco recently lol. Otherwise, I do like their big bags of trail mix.
 
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