Shop like ya mean it….

People don’t go to Costco to shop. They THINK they go to Costco to shop but they are really going there for an afternoon of free food and socializing. It’s true. You go to Costco with the intention of buying 3 lbs. of bananas, 5 pounds of chicken wings and 3 dozen eggs and you leave with a $100 pool float.

I’d like to go on the record that I DID NOT leave with that $100 pool float (I really didn’t) but I’ll bet that a lot of other folks did.

Costco’s marketing department is BRILLIANT. For a nominal fee you get to be a member of this private little club where they sell stuff. Lots and lots of stuff. The trick is to get out of the store with ONLY WHAT YOU NEED. Is a 5 pound bag of wings a good idea? Sure, they do okay in the freezer for a while and if you’ve got teen-agers you can blow through that in one busy weekend, yes they qualify as a good purchase.

The hot tub I bought at Costco, EXCELLENT PURCHASE. Yuppers, that one was a bargain and the customer service was amazing, delivered it right up to where it was supposed to go, quick and easy. Oh and that was a PLANNED purchase we were actually LOOKING for a new hot tub it wasn’t an impulse purchase in the warehouse.

That’s the danger zone…the store itself. The pretty, shiny new objects all over the place, they drag you down quickly and completely.

It’s easy to get sucked into the spirit of the whole retail event as they stuff you every few feet with some other delectable treat, some new way to serve up salad dressing or salsa. It’s just like being at the county fair or your town’s founders’ day. You eat and run into people you know. Every time I’ve been in Costco all of the display seating for whichever season of the year is currently being pitched is full of people chatting each other up. Currently there are some lovely sets of outdoor furniture gracing the warehouse floor and each one was a living vignette showing happy people chowing down and catching up with each other.

In the middle of this social experiment are strategically placed items like that aforementioned $100 pool float. I was drawn to it. The box was lovely; it showed a young woman drifting on this item surrounded by a clear blue sea. The thing itself is about the size of one of Costco’s much loved dog beds (they really are a good purchase there, inexpensive, pretty and good quality) and it claims to be like floating on a cloud. That’s all well and good but it also costs $94.99 plus tax. I have a few pool floats that I bought over the past few years at the Five and Below store that work pretty well and if I only get one season out of it, well, it was $5 (or below).

The more I fixated on the $100 pool float the more I realized the beauty of Costco’s marketing. Here was this thing that did not fold up and store easily but cost $100. Let’s do the math on this little item. In the Northeast it is often said that Summer lasts approximately from Memorial Day to Labor Day weekend which, depending on the calendar that year, is roughly 100 days. Do you really go in your pool all 100 of those days? Nope. Some days are too cold, some days it rains and other days you’re just too busy. Hell fifty days is even a long shot but if we go with that number it comes down to costing you two dollars a day for this pool float. It just doesn’t add up for me. And here’s what’s gonna happen with said pool float. Summer will end and you’ll pack away all the Summer stuff; you’ll do your best to make sure everything is dry and packed up nicely. Those $5 pool floats will be deflated, dried up and rolled into a nice little, easy-to-store ball. Simple. But that $100 float that’s not gonna store so well is it? You’re gonna toss it in the shed or garage or basement and over the course of the long, cold winter things will happen to it. It’ll grow a little mold, it’ll stiffen up a bit (losing it’s “cloudlike feel”), it’ll just become dingy and next Spring as Memorial Day looms large in the future you’ll unpack it, shake your head at it and toss it to the curb.

Then you’ll head over to Costco to buy 5 pounds of chicken wings and 3 dozen eggs and you’ll be sucked into the next best $100 thing that you have no use for.
It’s brilliant, it really is.

I can think of a whole bunch of stuff that are smart things to buy at Costco but that isn’t why people go there, they think they are going there to “shop smart” but they’re really going there to be lured into consumer bliss.

I’ve gotten better of late. Much better. I don’t buy 5 pounds of grapes for a family of two, I go to a regular ol’ grocery store and buy 1 or 2 pounds of grapes so that we can enjoy them before they become unidentifiable mush in the fridge. I make a list now when I go to Costco and I try REALLY, REALLY hard not to be swayed. But I see it all around me, people slurping down free food, socializing and buying $100 pool floats.

Oh retail bliss, what suckers we are.