The Warehouse Grocery Store That’s Even Cheaper Than Costco And Sam’s Club

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The Warehouse Grocery Store That’s Even Cheaper Than Costco And Sam’s Club

The long, exhausting fight against inflation continues. As consumers scramble to find the cheapest sources for food, many have chosen to stock up on bulk items at Costco and Sam’s Club. However, there is one other warehouse store where your buck may stretch even further: WinCo Foods. If you live in one of the 10 states where the business operates, primarily in the American West, WinCo may already be a household name.

For those who have never set foot in the supermarket chain, it’s not unlike perusing the aisles of Costco or Sam’s Club. There are nearly ceiling-high shelves stocked with canned and boxed goods, butchers working the meat case, and fresh bread coming out of the bakery. However, what makes WinCo different from those big-box clubs is that the savings start as soon as you walk through the door. At WinCo, membership isn’t required, and that alone is a draw. Annual membership fees cost $65 or $130 a year at Costco (

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) and $50 or $110 annually at Sam’s Club (

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).

WinCo can offer many of its items at a lower rate because it cuts out the middleman — distributors — and buys directly from manufacturers and farms. Other cost-cutting measures include no advertising or marketing, having customers bag their own groceries, and prohibiting credit card payments to avoid hefty transaction fees. Ultimately, those savings are then passed on to shoppers. Finally, the stores are known for their sprawling bulk bin sections — most containing more than 800 products — resulting in lower prices per unit.

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Employee-Ownership Means Retirement Riches

A sign thanking customers above a WinCo exit – Summer_Wind/Shutterstock

While everyone loves a bargain, which WinCo delivers in spades, it is also gratifying to know that your hard-earned dollars support an employer that rewards its workers with financial security rather than undercutting wages — an all-too-common practice at some competitors like Walmart, which cut its starting pay for some new hires in 2023. WinCo employees are also owners and have been since 1985, when the Boise, Idaho-founded company launched an Employee Stock Ownership Plan, which effectively functions as a retirement program for workers.

According to

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, every employee becomes a part of the program after turning 19 years old, putting in 500 hours in their first six months, and accumulating 1,000 hours each fiscal year. The company states its ESOP share values (not valued on the open stock market) have risen at an annual compounded rate of about 18% since the year after the plan started. What does that look like to an employee? “$5,000 worth of stock in 1986 now has stock worth almost $863,000,” the employee-owned warehouse notes. So, you may not be able to order Costco’s

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at WinCo, but shopping there does support this employee-owner model. Even better, most WinCos are open 24/7, so you can score bargains around the clock.

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#Warehouse #Grocery #Store #Cheaper #Costco #Sams #Club

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