Our membership lapsed years ago, but I’m being tempted back with a two months free trial.

I know that the food is good quality if you have the space to store it, but looking at general household stuff, is any of it cheaper than you can find on the high Street or supermarkets?

A quick look around suggested that things like toiletries still work out cheaper elsewhere, so I can’t see it being worth the membership once I’ve stocked up on their merino mix trail socks.

Convince me with your tales of budgeting astuteness.

Pallets of bog roll ?

skippy, muffins, rice, mango chutney, levi 501s ( £40) toilet rolls, car shampoo, giant tubs of haribo for rides out

keep in mind they run offers throughout the year on some decent stuff.

Also tyres if you are into michelins. Cheap lunch at the canteen.

Pallets of bog roll ?

That’s a crap suggestion.

bog roll, cereal, cat food and washing powder. Some of their freshly prepped food is really rather good too (enchiladas, I’m looking at you).

Never found it that useful. One example was me being blown away by an enormous jar of Branston pickle which I obviously had to buy. I managed to eat about a fifth of it before it went off. The fresh food is lovely though.

Wife says ‘ Luke’s Organic Cheddar Clouds’ £2 a 0.5 kg bag. Wotsits, but pretend healthy like.

As above – bog rolls, washing powder and cat food.

Also the overpriced carrot cake they sell you at the cafe in Swinley.

Ha, I came out with two packs of bog roll on offer once after work (pack being 6×12). Turns out 144 bog rolls are an extreme pain in the arse to get home on a bus followed by the subway with a walk in between.

Was worth it though, we had enough to build forts or wall up peoples doors with.

501’s for £40? Hmm…

Electricals CAN be had cheap but honestly, unless you are a trade member forget any ridiculous deals as the vultures will have the place picked clean ten minutes after trade doors open. Stuff will usually be left over but don’t count on getting the flagship models, it was usually the next best that was left for the peasants.

Their meat is excellent, just portion it up and stick in the freezer.

Look for deals on washing powder, dish washer tablets, wine and beer. Good for nappies and wipes if you have little ones.

That summer cabin with the hot tub in it looks great 😉

Had the same query about Costco a couple of weeks ago. We just send the in-laws instead of paying our self.

Home Bargains Nicky bog roll FTW. Cheap as chips, and considerably more absorbent.

Their meat is excellent, just portion it up and stick in the freezer.

It’s Ok, but I worry about the quality and practices of the farming. The pork chops are huge, 2x the size of anything in the local butchers and imported from the USA. I’ve no idea what they feed them in the USA but I’m guessing the poor pig didn’t live in a field and eat organic food.

Also the overpriced carrot cake they sell you at the cafe in Swinley.

The icing is made with lard rather than butter, that’s why it’s so creamy.

You might be getting the impression I hate the place. It’s like Iceland, but with worse food, marketed to the middle classes.

Depends how you shop. I have one locally and pop in to buy the meat, fish and fresh veg, fruit as is do with waitrose, sainsburys etc.

If I shopped there a few times a year I’d probably not bother.

Ours is local so I go there weekly mainly for the meat and fresh produce getting the remainder of the shopping from Tesco or Aldi. The quality of the food you get there is much better than the supermarkets and we don’t have a good a local butcher. Buying in bulk is OK if it’s regularly used other wise just get it from the supermarket. I have plenty of bulk stuff stored in the garage and just bring it into the kitchen to keep the cupboards stocked.
I also have the executive membership which is more expensive than the standard one. You are supposed to get exclusive offers but never had one in the three years I’d had it but you get cash back too which has given me over £350 back above the cost of membership. This used to be as a voucher to use in store but this year was actual cash in hand.
The prepared food is really good as mentioned above. Their cooked chickens are full of flavour and around 1/3 bigger and cheaper than supermarket ones which are dry and tasteless.

Beef (they have UK produced Angus mostly) – not necessarily better than the butcher, but tasty.
Chicken is never free range, so tend not to bother.
We get sides of salmon & portion it up for the freezer.

Big lumps of cheese are quite good value.

Bakery stuff is ok.

Be careful on things like washing powder – what looks like great value on a giant box is often matched by Tesco bogof offers.

It’s Ok, but I worry about the quality and practices of the farming. The pork chops are huge, 2x the size of anything in the local butchers and imported from the USA. I’ve no idea what they feed them in the USA but I’m guessing the poor pig didn’t live in a field and eat organic food.

The fresh meat is UK sourced and the beef is supposed to be from Buccleuch Meats which is very high quality. Some of the vacuum sealed meats can be from the USA but are labelled as such.
As someone who worked in pig breeding in the past you should be more concerned with the Danish pork products as their animal welfare is far behind the UK or USA’s.

IME the prices are never as good as the offers at supermarkets, etc, plus whenever I’ve gone I’ve massively overbought on stuff which price aside I didn’t really need anyway, so I don’t bother going now.

Occasionally they have a decent reduction on a big ticket item like a telly or something – which is great if you happened to be about to buy it somewhere else anyway – but you can normally hear about these offers on HUKD without actually having to keep popping in.

501’s for £40? Hmm…

Having been so defensive about their brand in the past Levi’s will now stick a 501 tab on any old crap, quality, spec and even sizing can be all pretty variable so don’t assume a £40 pair in one shop are the same as an £80 pair in another.

These days I just use costco once or twice a year for all the ‘B’s

Bog roll
Bagels
Binbags
bLaundry detergent
Boxer shorts (well pringles trunks)

If you’ve got a family to shop for theres value in the food but as a two-person household pretty much everything is sold in packs and portions too big to be useful – either because they’d go off before you can eat all or you’ll just get bored of it. And I can only fit so many bagels in the freezer.

I pop in weekly for teabags, an inflatable canoe and a 150 litre compressor.

We think we get our moneys worth out of the membership every year.

Fresh food is great, especially for parties.
Cakes as above.
Fresh meat as above.
My wife buys a shampoo in there which is massively cheaper than on the high st.

We bought all our nappies there when the kids were small, the deals they did on Huggies were miles better than the best the supermarkets could do – we bought a 1000 in one hit once!

I’m apparantly about to get 10% discount on a kitchen if paying the order via CostCo, I’ll let you know how it goes.

don’t assume a £40 pair in one shop are the same as an £80 pair in another.

This. Everyone is at it now – e.g. chocolates/crisps being packaged especially for Poundland to make you think like you’re getting a bargain, goods specifically manufactured for “outlet” shops – even premium brands like Berghaus are at it (Sports Pursuit). I’m always pretty skeptical about these sorts of “offers” now.

The Teabags are the ones that annoy me most, bogroll can be hidden in the airing cupboard, but 1000 teabags to save 10p over just buying whatever hapend to be on offer in the supermarket, and takes up a whole cupboard shelf in the kitchen?

Best one was Miss’ decided she likes seaweed from the chinese, so she came back with a pallet of the stuff from Costco. She then decided she doesn’t like costco seaweed.

Anyone in Reading want 19 packets of seaweed? Will swap for a girlfriend who doesn’t have a costco card.

I pop in weekly for teabags, an inflatable canoe and a 150 litre compressor.

🙂
No Aldi near you then

Their meat is excellent, just portion it up and stick in the freezer.

Thier freezer bags however, are a rip off.

They sometimes beat the supermarkets on branded dishwasher tablets etc. but you do have to have your maths head on. You can usually get better deals at B&M or home bargains if you’re opportunistic enough.

Overall i find Costco a massive pain in the gnards.

Fuel. Bristol just built a fuel station, it is currently it is 4p per litre cheaper than the esso round the corner. And cheaper than the fuel card prices we have.
They seemed pretty busy at lunchtime.
When I went to collect the two cooked 14″ Pizzas for £7.80 each.

Waves at TheDTs – was there the other day and saw premium diesel was 102ppl and regular unleaded 99ppl.

The UK meat is excellent. Don’t touch the USA stuff. The big pork chops are British (they may do USA ones but never looked at those).

Humus – soooo much cheaper than a supermarket and much nicer. Just have to be prepared to eat a lot of it.

Black pudding – huge and portion it up. British bacon too and the eggs are from well treated hens.

Cleaning stuff when on offer (and dishwasher tablets). The Detol version of napysan is about £3 a bottle.
24 cans of Thatchers Gold for £16
Zipock sandwich bags for my lab as they are nice and strong.
Berghaus/North face tops, and the kirkland ones are good for farming
Baked goods are very good but we avoid most or we would get fat
Oat so simple sachets and PG tips when on offer are much better than any supermarket offer.

oh and dried mushrooms are back in the Bristol store. The jar is about half the size as it used to be but still much better value than supermarkets.

The warranty on electricals is great. I swapped a 2 year old washer and a 5 year old TV no problems at all

And the takeaway pizzas are great

oh and the big tub of salmon pate mmmmm

The toffee loaf from bakery is worth the membership fee alone 😀

Humus – soooo much cheaper than a supermarket and much nicer. Just have to be prepared to eat a lot of it.

Does it keep well now – the big pots of it were lovely but they’d go fizzy if you didn’t eat them within 24 hours after you’d opened it so I stopped buying them.

dunno, only time we every buy the big pots is when having BBQs so plenty of people round to tuck in. 24hrs suggests something wrong though. They keep having a problem with wholemeal pita breads in our store. Seen quite a lot of mouldy ones on sale.

We got the pack of 3 smaller, flavoured ones the the other day and they are pretty decent but don’t last long in his house.

The merino wool socks,
Dewalt work boots,
And own brand white round neck t shirts.

And huge sweet strawberries .

and tomatoes. Nice big on the vine ones for £1.99

And the packs of mozzarella to have with said tomatoes.

24hrs suggests something wrong though

at the time all supermarket humous would go off that fast too- presumable they either pasteurise it somehow now of add formaldehyde or something ( 🙂 ) Nowdays supermarket humous is pretty much impervious to the passage of time, I’ve let stuff go way past its use by date and not go off- I was just wondering if costcos stuff is similarly improved

Zipock sandwich bags for my lab

That’s one pampered Labrador!

Thanks for the tips – lots of you confirming my suspicion that it only really works with a calculator and a full knowledge of supermarket special offers!

Never found it that useful. One example was me being blown away by an enormous jar of Branston pickle which I obviously had to buy. I managed to eat about a fifth of it before it went off. The fresh food is lovely though.

Pickle, off? You’re doing it wrong, pickle in the fridge will outlive a human .

Coffee Beans are he cheapest I’ve seen anywhere and really rather good.

Oh and this time of year, Cinnamon Rolls, nom nom.
Stamps are cheaper than at the post office, never worked that one out.
5 rung glass fibre Youngman step ladder. Cheaper than I could find anywhere online.

Returns on electricals is brilliant.
I was told last January, people (Chavs) go in December buy a MASSIVE TV, use it for Christmas and new year and take it back in January for a refund. I expect returns situation will change if people take the wee wee..

Scott shop towels cheaper than anywhere else
Bog rolls by the pallet
And red velvet cake although they don’t do the red velvet cupcakes anymore