A married couple with a mutual love of Costco have written a book about the retailer – they usually have also discovered many suggestions about navigating shopping there over the years.
David and Susan Schwartz wrote “The Joy of Costco: A Treasure Hunt from A to Z” together, with Susan describing it in a joint FOX Business interview on Thursday as a “love letter” to the retailer. The self-published book hit stores – including Costco – in mid-September.
The book features a broad range of data about Costco and various morsels related to global operations in an “A to Z” format.
The thought of writing it stemmed from their love of Costco and arose in 2016, not long after David’s completion of a biography and as he was “in search of other books to write,” in keeping with David.
While walking in Recent York City, Susan “turns to me and says, ‘Hey, I even have a great idea. Why don’t we write a book together about Costco? We like it, we love every little thing about it, we are able to discover all about how they do what they do, and I’m sure Costco members can be keen on reading about it,’” he recounted.
The Schwartzes said creating the book took seven years.
At the starting, Costco “had no real interest in having a book written,” Susan said, calling the company “inherently modest.”
“It took us two years to satisfy the surviving co-founder Jim Sinegal and the CEO Craig Jelinek. It took us then three years to persuade them we were writing the book whether or not they liked it or not,” said told FOX Business.
The corporate eventually provided them with behind-the-scenes access after realizing they were going to maneuver forward with the project either way, in keeping with Susan.
The couple estimated they made stops at 225-250 warehouses globally along the way. In addition they clocked 220,000 miles.
In late September, Costco reported its warehouse count stood at 861.
Slightly below 600 of those were positioned in the U.S. or Puerto Rico, while the company identified the remaining ones as being in 13 other countries.
David told FOX Business they “don’t have a favorite Costco but there are some Costco stores which can be really quite remarkable.” The couple specifically mentioned the one in Santa Fe, Mexico City, with a rooftop park; the smallest in Juneau, Alaska; and the largest in Salt Lake City, Utah.
“They’re all the time the same but all the time different,” Susan said. “About 40% of the product is different regionally.”
Making the most out of Costco shopping trips
The Costco-loving Schwartzes have picked up various suggestions for navigating the retailer’s warehouses, which they said typically has a “curated” inventory of three,800 sorts of items.
“The very first thing is, Costco is committed to early in, early out so in the event you’re in search of Halloween costumes, don’t go there on October 15 because they’re probably all gone,” Susan told FOX Business. “Back-to-school isn’t, , the end of August, it’s in July – that type of thing. Valentine’s Day is way before everybody else because Costco gets in they usually get out.”
Susan said there are services at Costco that some people aren’t as conversant in, comparable to their hearing aids center, where she said testing was free and she or he got the devices for significantly lower than other places. The couple takes advantage of their pharmacy services and rents cars through the company, too.
One other tip, David said, was that shoppers should undergo all the warehouse’s aisles .
“The inventory is all the time changing, and also you never know what you’re going to seek out. As well as, the pricing may change infrequently, they could have rebates or they could have special markdowns,” he explained.
Costco members must also be on the lookout for the “Death Star” asterisk that sometimes appears in the corner of price labels at the retailer. It “means the item goes to be discontinued either permanently or temporarily,” Susan said.
She said buying a couple of the items you want which have the asterisk can ensure you’ve got it and “sends a message to the home office that this product continues to be viable.”
At the end of its fourth quarter, Costco counted a total of 127.9 million membership cardholders.
This week, Costco revealed Jelinek plans to step down at the end of the yr as a part of a “long-standing succession plan.” COO Ron Vachris will take over the job at the moment.
Shares of the retailer finished out Friday’s trading day at slightly below $553.