Costco/Sams - Canyou really save money?

[zetta]

I also found that clipping coupons didn't save me much (I don't buy much "brand-label" food), and am not willing to invest the effort that a price book or meal-planning takes. What worked for me was a subscription to Welcome to SavingDinner.com -- you get 6 recipes and a shopping list each week. Just by using the shopping list and recipes our weekly grocery trip dropped from averaging over $100 to around $75-$80. Our family has 2 adults and a toddler. We also pick up a lot of "fun food" from Trader Joes -- about $100 - $150 a month, including wine -- but could cut this out if we needed to.

[CoryWM]

My grocery and household item bills seem to be getting out of control. We are spending at least $100/wk an that's just for 2 people.

I don't have time to clip coupons or play the grocery game, but I do want to shop smarter.

My first question - can you really save money with a Costco/Sams Club membership? What are your experiences - good and bad - with these membership clubs?

Second question - what are some other ways to save money on groceries? Our biggest problem is going to the store too often, so one way we can save on groceries is to do some menu planning and cut the grocery store trips. Any other ideas?

Thanks!
Kristine

Club Membership. It's not that you won't save money on the products. Because you will. You will pay less per peice than if you were at a normal store.

That being said. You WILL spend more money at a club shop as opposed to a normal shopping trip. Let's say, you're buying multigrain bread. Normally at the store lets say it's 3.00 a loaf. And at the club, it's 2.25 a loaf! Great! Except it's always packaged in 2+ bundles. So you have to buy 2-3 loafs a time. You will waste some. You will buy more than you NEED, Because it's cheaper. Club places know this. Thats why it's always clearly shown the price per unit on everything. Soda, cheese, crackers, whatever it is, it's broken down to show you, you're saving.

You have to be very desciplined, to come out ahead from a club membership, freezing extras, comparing it to other stores etc. Most people, don't shop at the club place to save money, they do it, because it's the trendy place that has everything they need.

You may go there, because you need 5lbs of shredded cheese. And hamburger buns. The cheese is a good deal. Then you go to get the buns, and say costco only sells them 24 at a time... And you only needed 8? Even though, it's cheap, 2.50 for 24... you Still paid 2.5x the amount at say safeway, 99cents for 8-12... They count on the convience of shopping there to make their profits.

I used to work there as a food deminstrator. They actually move the bottled water around every day in costco, so that customers will have to search the grounds for it, because it increases sales on items they happen to walk by.

I also advise never taking anyone but yourself there, if you take kids or a husband, you'll end up buying things that arnt groveries. Clothes, dvds, computers, tvs, camping, sports, etc. Everything gets rotated through Costco seasonally, they know they have a captive audience, as soon as you sign up, so they can put anything they want in there, to entice you to buy it.

From being around costco alot. I always hear in my head, when someone gets outa there for under $100, that they're getting outa there cheaply.

[disneysteve]

It's not that you won't save money on the products. Because you will. You will pay less per peice than if you were at a normal store.

I don't think that is a fair assumption. We've gone into the warehouse clubs with our price book and found many items that we commonly buy were more expensive than in the regular supermarket, even though they were being sold in bulk. Add in sale prices and double coupons and the supermarkets come out even farther ahead. I think the warehouse clubs thrive on people assuming things are cheaper there.

[Scanner]

Coupons are tricky business. Most Sunday coupons are for name-brand stuff. It's better to just buy generic.

But if you are brand loyal (let's say Hellman's Mayo vs. Generic Mayo) then yes, go for the coupons.

As far as Sams/BJ's, it's the same thing - you gotta watch the name brand stuff. Berkleys is BJ's generic brand and yes, I do think you make out. Diapers alone pays for the membership but other things too - laundry detergent, soda, contact lense solution, Ibuprofen, batteries, etc.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Another tip, it depends on where you live. I like in a terrible area for prices, coupons, and stores. I've found that grocery prices vary a lot and people elsewhere pay substantially less than I do. I don't have a meijer, super walmart or target, food lion, publix, etc. I have crappy stores with bad prices in general. So Costco saves me a lot and I've got a price book so I know when I'm getting a deal at the store. But when I've price against others on message boards my prices are "bad".

[PrincessPerky]

That being said. You WILL spend more money at a club shop as opposed to a normal shopping trip. Let's say, you're buying multigrain bread. Normally at the store lets say it's 3.00 a loaf. And at the club, it's 2.25 a loaf! Great! Except it's always packaged in 2+ bundles. So you have to buy 2-3 loafs a time. You will waste some. You will buy more than you NEED, Because it's cheaper. Club places know this. Thats why it's always clearly shown the price per unit on everything. Soda, cheese, crackers, whatever it is, it's broken down to show you, you're saving.

Yeah but if you use 6 loaves in a week..easier to buy 2 at a time than 6 separate.....Though I will ditto that some things you don't need 6 at a time, and will go bad or be used to fast if you had them...you gotta do your homework.

You have to be very disciplined, to come out ahead from a club membership, freezing extras, comparing it to other stores etc. Most people, don't shop at the club place to save money, they do it, because it's the trendy place that has everything they need.

Ditto you have to be disciplined...though I would say that is true of most financial decisions.

And I wish they had everything I needed! but no we have to go to 4 different stores to get the best price/product. (in rotation...no way would we spend that much in gas to make it to all 4)

[markusk]

This is quite interesting because the reason I found this forum awhile back was precisley because I was trying to research this very same topic: I googled "costcos vs. bj vs. sams club" and one of the links led me to this page (I think the thread was 2-3 years old)...

The general consensis on this forum a few years ago was what people have just said, namely that in general, the cost of membership does not save you money.

But I joined anyway.

Have you guys been to a costcos on a weekend 10-15 minutes before opening? I thought I was at a rock concert! There were literally 100's of people milling about waiting for the doors to open. I will never do that again.

Anyway, I was a satisfied member of costcos for over a year until we had a baby and we liked pampers diapers over the other brands. Only BJ's carry pampers, so we switched. I think we save on diapers alone.

I have to disagree with some of the folks here and say that cutting coupons is a waste of time. I've only found coupons of items I don't normally buy or need. Granted, I don't get the sunday papers every week, but when I do, I always check for coupons I can use. But alas, no. Also, I haven't seen advertizements for double/triple coupon specials in years (the late 1980's maybe?) -- does it depend on where you live?

[disneysteve]

I have to disagree with some of the folks here and say that cutting coupons is a waste of time.

Granted, I don't get the sunday papers every week

I haven't seen advertizements for double/triple coupon specials in years (the late 1980's maybe?) -- does it depend on where you live?

We have the Sunday paper delivered. So think of it this way. The paper is about $8/month. If we can find $4 in coupons (that get doubled at the store) each month, we've covered the cost of the paper. That's only $1/week or 2 50-cent coupons. It really isn't tough, for us at least, to find 2 useful coupons per week.

As for double coupons, every store in the PA/NJ area that I'm aware of doubles coupons so that isn't a problem around here. It is standard practice. I'm actually surprised to hear there are places that don't do it (other than the discount chains).

[sweeps]

I haven't been following this thread very closely, but I recently quit Costco. After running the numbers I found that I wasn't saving anything. I start out in the hole every year by paying the $50 membership fee. So I have to recoup that $50 just to break even. Then you have to scrutinize the prices because while some things are good deals, some things are a big ripoff. I think if you're very careful with your purchases, you come out ahead, but if you're being that careful with your purchases, you could come out ahead anywhere -- this means watching for sales, using coupons, etc.

[pearlieq]

I'm actually surprised to hear there are places that don't do it (other than the discount chains).

Count yourself lucky. There's literally nowhere in the Chicago area that will double coupons. It's just not done out here--believe me, I've looked!

It takes a lot of the shine out of couponing. I stopped collecting them a couple of years ago. We didn't actually the paper and couldn't justify $8 a month to get the odd coupons. The products we use are either store brands, not branded (produce and meat), and so specialized that coupons aren't offered.

We're much better served having found a grocery store with consistently low prices.

[pearlieq]

As for the price club issue, I don't think one saves there--if anything we wound up spending more. We would wind up buying packages of snack foods and frozen entrees that we didn't need, simply because they looked tasty or convenient.

The prices on most staple good were the same or more expensive than the grocery store and in sizes that were much too large to be practical for 2.

I could see it maybe being a better deal for large families, especially while the young ones are still in diapers, but not for a couple.

[parafly]

Shopping at a club warehouse definitely saves you money. We buy our meat, cheese, and bread in bulk, but there are many more items to save than just the food. You can also buy large packages of household items like toilet paper, paper towels, razors, deodorant, soap, brita filters, pet food, etc that will last you months (if not a full year) and will save lots of money in the long run. The membership easily pays for itself.

[Vapors]

Re: Food Lion

I ONLY buy sales items (mostly loss leader meats and produce) at Food Lion. Wal-Mart beats Food Lion's regular prices on everything I've ever compared. (I would say, "With few exceptions" except I can't remember any exceptions.) Unless you are not near a Wal-Mart Supercenter, or are of the anti-Wal-Mart crowd, I'd recommend you check them against each other in your area. I was shocked when I actually did a real, notebook-in-hand, price comparison between the two. I had previously always thought of Food Lion as a low-price store.

We don't have a Walmart close by. It's a 15-20 minute drive and that's a regular Walmart. It has some groceries but no produce/meats. They are considering (trying if they can get approval) to build one a lot closer. I am hoping they do.

[momof1in150]

By shopping at BJs and buying some items in bulk I reduce the number of times I have to purchase that item(s) which in turn can save me gas because if I have a good stockpile then I don't have as many errands to run.

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

Of course, you must shop as carefully at these stores as you would at a regular grocery store to save moeny. We belong to just one such store, Costco. We save our membership fee with our first case and a half or so of wine. Their selection is not huge, but we can always find something we're happy with. These purchases are the driving reason for me to pay a membership fee.

Sometimes we find good produce prices there, but quantities are so large that we have to be prepared for the two or three of us to have the same vegetable with every meal for several days, or to process and freeze excess.

We had heard that the Kirkland (Costco brand) laundry detergent was excellent for the price, so I gave it a try. It would not completely dissolve in cold to warm water, so I returned the box. Perhaps it was from a bad batch; I might try it again in the future.

I recently recommended on another thread that the 2 pound sacks of yeast are a tremendous bargain, at the same price as a mere three packets at the grocery store. However, Costco flour prices can be beat everyday at Aldi's and quite often beat any any regular grocery during "the holidays." Wild, individually frozen blueberries are a great deal and we like the large volume which is convenient for everyday breakfasts.

About every other trip we will buy meat--usually a large roast which I cut into thirds and freeze. I never even see roasts this big at the grocery anymore. They are the kind that a very large family can cook and have leftovers for meals throughout the week. Cheeses are sometimes a little better priced than we get elsewhere; sometimes not. Quality of cheeses is variable, but we've enjoyed the experimenting, and I will say that the sample people in that section have introduced us to a few--some good, some so-so.

I'd like to look into their Optometric services. Off hand, their prices on frames looked fair.

My husband checks out computer and camera related stuff at Costco, but doesn't often buy there. He usually thinks he can do better elsewhere. I think he has bought quantities of disks, flash drives, memory cards, etc when they have had a great published coupon. But he goes through them in his work like a horse through hay.

A neighbor asked me to buy her a specialty shampoo at Costco, explaining that they had it for 1/3 less than the discount stores. However, Costco was no longer carrying it when I looked. I've compared some vitamin and supplement prices. Some were good, many were, so-so. This is an area where I should keep a price book because I find it hard to remember prices, especially price per quantity at various stores.

Anyway, it all adds up to your needing to be as careful at Costco as you would be anywhere else.