In 1976, a store opened on Morena Boulevard in San Diego. It was a store that quickly spread across the United States and became one of the largest companies in the United States and in the rest of the world as well. This store is Costco, also known as Costco Wholesale Corporation, and it has grown to be one of the most impressive companies in the entire world. Costco is an American membership wholesale club whose first location opened in 1976 under the Price Club name and became a very large company that makes around $120 billion a year. Costco is an American membership wholesale club based in Issaquah, Washington. According to “About Us.” (“About Us.” About | Costco) , Costco was the world’s first membership wholesale club, which means
Costco started off in an old airplane hangar that had been converted in order for the store to open on Morena Boulevard, San Diego. At first, Costco was under the Price Club name and only offered stock to small businesses, however, in 1983, the very first Costco opened in Seattle, Washington, and offered stock to the public. A decade after the first Costco was opened, Costco had around fifty different warehouses all across the United States, and Price Club and Costco decided to merge and call themselves PriceCostco. By 1997, there were over two-hundred locations all around the world and PriceCostco officially changed to Costco Companies Incorporated. In 1998, Costco.com is started, which generated more sales than ever. A year later, the Costco name is changed again to Costco Wholesale Corporation.
A decade after Costco’s name had become Costco Wholesale Corporation, each Costco location generated around $130 million a year. Overall, this exceeds $1 billion in sales by the end of the year. By the end of 2007, Costco was one of the top wholesalers in the entire world since they have over 45 million membership card-holders and had been named the, “most admired” company by Fortune Magazine twice. Throughout the past couple years, Costco’s sales have been higher than ever and the company continues to
In addition to that, the net amount of sales has gone up by an extreme amount, reaching over $120 billion. According to “27 Interesting Costco Statistics.” (Smith, Craig. “27 Interesting Costco Statistics.” DMR, 21 Oct. 2017, expandedramblings.com/index.php/costco-statistics/.) , the majority of Costco’s sales come from food, especially the rotisserie chicken, which, according to “Why Costco Will Never Raise the Price of Rotisserie Chicken.” (Galarza, Daniela. “Why Costco Will Never Raise the Price of Rotisserie Chicken.”Eater, Eater, 5 Jan. 2018) , “Last year, Americans bought 625 million rotisserie chickens at supermarkets; Costco alone sold 87 million…”. This shows how popular the rotisserie chicken and how much money Costco makes on it alone. To go along with the rotisserie chicken, Costco also makes a lot of money off of their $1.50 hot dog and drink combo. This combo has stayed the same price since Costco first opened to the public in 1983, and the reason behind this is because it attracts more customers. Between the rotisserie chicken being eaten, the cars being sold, and the gas being pumped at Costco, the sales climb higher and higher each