The Costco Experience

My wife had a fun idea for today. In addition to going out to eat, we were going to stop by Costco and get a membership.  She had a discount for a membership and we used to belong to BJ's years ago, so we figured we would check it out and see if we liked it.

Since they didn't open until 10 am, we didn't show up until 10:20.  The two parking lots nearby were almost full and there had to 300-500 cars.  I told my wife there was no way all these people had just arrived, they had to have opened at 9:00 or earlier.  There were swarms of people going in and coming out and it really looked like they were giving stuff away.  An employee at the door told me they opened at 9:45 and people were lining up to get in at 9:15.

I thought I was at a football game. There were two lines of people leaving Costco and were being checked on the way out.  A number of people had only a few items in their cart, which seemed odd.  We got our picture taken for our cards and went in the membership door.  Immediately, my wife saw the televisions and pointed to an LG(the brand I used to sell part-time) and said, "I'd want one bigger than that." It was less than $600 which was a very good price, but I had to tell her, "it's 65 inches, that's a big TV."  Keep in mind, we have not owned a TV in four years.  Eyes get bigger in these stores and we had just walked in!

We got our steps in and walked through most of the store.  We did find a few good prices on salmon and most importantly a very good looking and large, rotisserie chicken.(I did eat a drumstick when I got home and it was very good) I also bought sweat pants, jeans, and two knee braces, which is a lot for me to buy in one day.

We managed to get out in an hour and a half and there were no long lines exiting the store.  They had a lot of stuff and it was the beginning of the holiday season, but they were crazy busy for a Wednesday morning.  You would think there were no Wal-Marts or supermarkets in the whole town.  We will go back, but there's no way we are going to be standing outside waiting for the store to open. Later in the day I tried to get my wife to go back for dinner at Costco because they had hot dogs and pizza, but she didn't go for it-something for us to do next time.