Food Theory: Costco DOESN’T Save You Money!

by Panzer
Agh, that's higher than it was last week.
[Employee] Excuse me, sir. Just gonna squeeze right by you.
Oh, come on! I haven't even had time to check out.
What can I say? Inflation is crazy. *phone notification* Oh, would you look at that?
Are you serious!?
Hello, Internet! Welcome to Food Theory. The only show that stretches your mind and
your hard earned dollar. Man, inflation has been brutal lately. Higher interest rates,
egg shortages, even price hikes on *gulp* Diet Coke. And you know what they say things
are likely going to get worse before they get better. So today I'm going to inflate
your brain with some money saving tips, and expose a couple of food myths along the way.
If you're a fan of dough and I know that you are considering this as a food channel,
after all, hit that subscribe button so you're always notified of when we post a new video.
For many of us, shopping at Costco is a rite of passage. From purchasing your first years’
supply of toilet paper to unlocking the secret that is the 4.99 rotisserie chicken. Costco has
become the place where you go for a jumbo pack of toilet paper and you walk out with a camping tent,
a food processor, and 12 lb of mozzarella cheese. Just leave your manners at the door and hover over
that sample table like the pizza vulture that you are. Bulk bulgogi and giant teddy bears aside,
the point of Costco is that you get a lot in one stop and you save a lot by buying
in bulk. In case you’re not familiar with this pinnacle of U.S. consumerism. Let me explain.
Costco's model is based on offering a limited stock of bulk only products at lower rates than
anywhere else. The premise is that for any item you know you'll use, whether it's paper towels,
blueberry muffins or TVs? I guess, Costco can sell you an enormous amount of that thing for
what should be a lower price. That said, all of this so-called cost savings is going to come with
its own heaping helping of traps, pitfalls and marketing ploys that'll stick it to you faster
than a 50 ounce bottle of maple syrup. But what if I told you that I have the secret to beating every
trick in the old Costco handbook? In fact, I know the single best technique for saving you the most
money on meals. And you can do it whether you're a family of one or 11. Come on, grab a flatbed
cart that's big enough to carry a mattress, and let's start talking about the Costco pro-strats.
To begin, before we even enter Costco, we're going to need to get past that bouncer waiting out
front. You see, Costco is a members only store, meaning that we can't get in without flashing
this piece of plastic with our own little face staring back at us. As of today, Costco offers
four types of memberships: a basic or gold star level starting at 60 bucks and a premium
or executive member level that will run you 120. These memberships are designed to be an investment
in yourself where you're basically betting that you can save $60, the cost of membership, over
the course of the entire year a few pennies at a time on each gallon tub of Gray Poupon that you're
lugging home. But this isn't always a bet that you know you're going to be able to win unless you've
done some serious math to calculate how many rolls of toilet paper, pounds of salmon and bags
of frozen broccoli you actually buy in a year. And Costco is well aware of this. They know that some
people with a membership are only going to enter the store a couple of times a year, meaning that