My wife and I went to Costco the other day to pick up a few items. Generally, I avoid big box stores in the same way I avoid beehives or jellyfish, but my wife promised we’d be in and out in no time. When it comes to shopping my wife is very adept, organized and disciplined, prepared to buy what she needs and no more, not the type of customer I associate with Costco.
I caught the big box heebie-jeebies right away. The entrance was jammed with people pushing mammoth carts. Before we got past the girl checking membership cards, a woman behind us rammed her cart into my heel. “That’s one reason I avoid this place,” I muttered under my breath. “Don’t start,” my wife said. I watched the woman who almost severed my Achilles veer left and make straight for the electronics, disappearing among the fifty and sixty inch HDTV’s. I felt dizzy, overwhelmed by the sheer size of the store, the industrial pallet racks stretching toward the ceiling, the sea of merchandise: stacks of books, piles of sweaters, jeans, shirts, tires, throw rugs, bath towels, BBQ grills, bicycles, golf clubs, vacuum cleaners, cases of wine, blocks of cheese. It’s enough to make my head spin. Everyone around us seemed to know one another and a quick vision of a Renaissance market passed through my mind. But this was a public square under a privately owned roof, a meticulously crafted business model, a machine of commerce.
570 stores, worldwide. South Korea, Mexico, Canada, Britain, and down under in Australia.
We’ve come to take it for granted, but the “warehouse” store is an innovative idea in the retail racket, and Costco has it wired. Concrete floor, no frills, no manufacturer’s coupons or blue light specials, big discounts on certain items, and the sense of being on a grand treasure hunt for something you didn’t know you had to have until you see it. Even in the midst of a hopeless recession the aisles are jammed with shoppers. Who has money to spend? I wondered.
A group of students from UCSB loaded a cart with breakfast cereal, toilet paper, bread, frozen burritos, Diet Coke and Dr. Pepper, orange juice, Cool Whip, dill pickles and bananas. By contrast, our cart is still empty. This makes me feel conspicuous, like an imposter. A woman in a red apron hands out Greek yogurt in tiny white cups. Two kids in soccer garb, parents nowhere to be seen, battle over a cup. “She gave it to me!” “No she didn’t!” “You can’t steal my yogurt!” “It’s not yours!” I told my wife that if we wanted to hear children squabble we could stay home. She shook her head at me and dropped a two and a half pound bag of coffee in our cart. Seattle Mountain, Costa Rican, whole bean. Alone in the big cart the coffee looked lonely.
“I feel like we should buy something large and substantial,” I said, “like 55 gallons of white vinegar. Something you have to wheel out with a pallet jack.”
She said, “Look for feminine hygiene products. I need maxipads.”
“How about five gallons of BBQ sauce?” I asked.
“Stop yourself.”
“Ketchup? We can always use ketchup.”
“Follow me, look for maxipads.”
By the time we finished our cart contained a whopping three items – the coffee, a jumbo pack of maxipads, and an oversized bottle of generic allergy medicine. The check out lines were backed up into the aisles and moving at a sloth’s pace. On the other side of the check-out area I watched people strain to roll carts overflowing with merchandise; once they got home with all that booty they would spend at least an hour putting it away. A squat woman in an eggplant sweat suit and black UGG’s pushed one cart and pulled another; she reminded me of a prospector during the gold rush, urging her pack mules up the trail.
“Let’s get a hotdog when we get out of here,” my wife said. “I’m hungry.”
“At this pace that will be tomorrow morning.”
“It’s not that bad. You up for a hotdog?”
“Can we get two or do they sell them by the dozen?”
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