MARILYN CORNWELL: costco

Showing posts with label costco. Show all posts

Sunday, October 26, 2025

Marilyn's Photos - Oct 26 2025 - Costco News

remember when the President’s Choice Insider Report would come out - a newsy, interesting newspaper insert with everything Dave Nichol has been up to in getting new food products into the Loblaws store. I worked at St. Clair and Yonge where the flagship store was located so it was a lot of fun back then. For a bit of nostalgia one can see his 1991 infomercials on YouTube - it has 10 key moments in the video. That tells us a lot about where our attention spans have gone since then.

Does Costco have a something similar in terms of promotion? It seems to me it has the kind of loyalty that Loblaws had back in the 90s. But then Loblaws was promoting exclusivity and elite products. Costco is promoting price savings on anything and everything. And it is everything - flooring, progressive eye glasses, cookies and cream protein shakes, and so on in the weekly flyer.. There is a “box” of Quaker quick oats - it is 5.16 kg - I don’t wonder where that would fit in my kitchen cupboards. It won’t fit anywhere.

That seems to be where we are as a society now - focused on buying as much as we can for as little as we can - and we call it cost savings. It makes sense as we are in a society that is inundated with products to buy. Costco has taken care of this with its flyer approach. You can see the Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Boxing Day flyers now. You can plan all your savings until the New Year.

On the other hand, Forbes says that part of Costco’s attraction is that it makes the in-store shopping fun with “treasures” to be discovered when walking down the aisles as things are placed randomly. It is called “friction” in shopping. While the PC Loblaws house brand is cheaper, the Kirkland brand is considered premium. Things like this give Costco the top rank in customer loyalty.

There’s nothing like an Ontario lake with the sun sparkling on the waves. Memories Of… that’s what Dave Nichols would say about the products he discovered during his travels.

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Thursday, August 8, 2024

Aug 8 2024 - Crazy Things at Costco

It seems like so many things come from Costco. "I got that at Costco." That was a common reply of the little sweet and savoury treats that came to the house for a recent gathering.

I don't go to Costco. Within me is an aversion to vast walls and shelves of "stuff". I don't like the Superstore for the same reason. One time I walked down the white paper stuff aisle - filled with toilet paper and paper towels - as far as I could see.

So am I justified in this aversion? What would you get at Costco that would be strange? There's lots of stuff it seems.

A 72 pound parmesan cheese wheel. The whole thing. The article said the entire wheel cost $949 (I expect that's US). Go to the Costco website and the features include: aged 24-moths, imported from italy, and Extravagant. They give wine pairing suggestions.

Just below that was a 28 pound bucket of mac and cheese. Known as the Chef's Banquet Macaroni and Cheese, and listed under Emergency Kits and Supplies, it has eight 30-serving portions of elbow macaroni and eight pounds of 30 serving portions of cheese sauce. It has a 25-year shelf life.

There's a 7-pound tub of Nutella. I looked this one up and now it is a 3 kg tub that is available. It has a 6 month shelf life so get eating.

What about a kilo of caviar? This will feed 30 to 50 people and costs $1,999 U.S. "This large tin of caviar will surely impress at your next event or party of 30 or more guests." That's a quote.

Next we move on to Prosciutto ham - the whole leg - Jambon Iberia at $550 per leg. No chef comes with it to use the companion cutting knife.

What about 11 pounds of Wagyu beef at $1,200.

And explain this - would one have to store a casket purchased from Costco? Costco will ship this item directly to your desired funeral home. It will take about 3 business days to reach you. No price is given. But you can get urns and they are under $100 and won't be so conspicuous when they arrive.

I guess this is a favourite topic and Business insider has a list of the"absurdly large portions" of things HERE.

Costco has legions of followers - its private label, its discount prices, its many products, and its generous return policy (which is an entire story of its own).

Here's one story:

"I make sure to take most visitors from overseas to Costco at least once. Depending on where they’re from, the sheer scale of it can be pretty impressive. So can the scale of their products. I’ve taken at least one photo of a visitor there holding a gallon of mayonnaise. If they’re not already familiar with the store, their job, while I shop for groceries, is to try to identify something you can’t buy from Costco."

Here's a train station from the past - it is in nearby Smithville - itself the sort of town name from the past.

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Wednesday, April 29, 2020

April 29 2020 - Asteroid Streaking By diverted by what not to buy from Costco

There's an asteroid streaking by this morning, but the headline below it diverted my interest - 14 products to never buy at Costco. The picture shows chocolate chip cookies in plastic clamshell containers. My reaction is that this might be an expose article on things like terrible contents in food and/or horrible factory practices in foreign countries. We are invited to ask: How terrible could the contents be?

And this one then diverted me from Costco: Study reveals after you die, your brain knows you're dead. This reminds me of "Headless Body in Topless Bar". It is contradictory making it humorously curious. So we would expect the headline to be the fun and the content would dwindle into suppositions and anecdotes.

It is interesting that I predict these things - I seem to have read a lot of articles. So let me find out how accurate I am.

Costco, and things to never buy. Which article will we read? There are at least 10 articles with this headline - so is it 6,7, 8, 10, 14, 15, 17, 27, 33 things? Some of the articles' subheading are what workers reveal to never buy. But the exposes aren't there. These are opinion articles on health, living habits, and other behaviours associated with greedy over-buying.

Our Headless Body equivalent headline has a number of permutations and they are funny. This one from The Mirror: When you die you KNOW you're dead because your brain still works - and you could even hear your death announced. Here's the original reference in 2017: The Sun's Andrea Downey article headline: After you die, your brain knows you’re dead, terrifying study reveals. The Guardian's version is: The man who could bring you back from the dead.

Didn't I just reference The Sun? There's the revelation right there. The UK Sun is considered to be neither reputable nor trustworthy. So we can expect Sam Parnia's study conducted out of New York University Langone School of Medicine to be something lesser/different. The excerpts from his study on brain activity after heart cessation don't reveal anything out of the ordinary. I found a notice for a New York Academy of Sciences moderated panel on the topic HERE with Sam Parnia as moderator. He is all over the news on this study - it was in Time magazine in 2008 - so I assume he is enjoying it all.

Perhaps we need a little bit of sunshine to clear away the laughter of satire and cynicism. Here's a happy greeting today.