- Buy a ton of small items, each with their own wasteful packaging? I buy 10lb bags of frozen chicken at Costco, and it has far less packaging than buying individual units. Same with peanut butter. Vegetables. Oil.
- Spend two hours a week hopping back and forth to grocery stores? What if I want to make 1-2 runs to Costco per month so I can cook food in bulk?
- Carefully hunt for which items at the grocery store are on sale, and which are heavily marked up? At Costco I am guaranteed that the price is at least competitive. I don't have to figure out whether the grocery-store vanilla bottle is competitive, or 3x wholesale price.
I mean, if you have time to spend, feel free to hop around speciality grocery stores 3 times a week, but I personally have no interest in that. I have better things to do. So maybe tone down the snobbery and acknowledge that other people have other priorities.
> At Costco I am guaranteed that the price is at least competitive.
Right, you know that Costco is taking making a 10% margin across the board. You'll never be able to exploit a loss-leader and fill your cart with below-cost X, but you're never getting overly hosed either.
If you're a well-to-do immigrant that hasn't built up a mind-map of "Buy A at X, buy B at Y, and only buy C when on-sale at Z", Costco is a low-cognitive load solution.
- Buy a ton of small items, each with their own wasteful packaging? I buy 10lb bags of frozen chicken at Costco, and it has far less packaging than buying individual units. Same with peanut butter. Vegetables. Oil.
- Spend two hours a week hopping back and forth to grocery stores? What if I want to make 1-2 runs to Costco per month so I can cook food in bulk?
- Carefully hunt for which items at the grocery store are on sale, and which are heavily marked up? At Costco I am guaranteed that the price is at least competitive. I don't have to figure out whether the grocery-store vanilla bottle is competitive, or 3x wholesale price.
I mean, if you have time to spend, feel free to hop around speciality grocery stores 3 times a week, but I personally have no interest in that. I have better things to do. So maybe tone down the snobbery and acknowledge that other people have other priorities.