Wednesday, October 19, 2011

To Costco or Not to Costco

In my money saving schemes I once made a deal with another family to split their Costco membership just so I could save $25/year. Before I did anything rash I actually sat down and did the numbers.

At the time, and just looking at gas, our local gas station was $.10 more expensive than Costco gas. We filled up about once a week for a 11-gallon tank car.
52 weeks in a year*(.1*11) = $57.20
A Costco membership is $50 a year, so just in gas I save $7.20 a year. However, this does not even count the groceries (or cellphones--coming soon) that I save on every year from shopping there. You do have to be careful though because not everything is cheaper. They get you on some items.

So, if I had paid for part of the membership I would have only gotten groceries since we wouldn't have had our own card and would have been to the mercy of whenever my friend went to Costco. Since we get gas there too it is worth it to have our own memebership.
It goes to show that sometimes you should crunch the numbers. Your findings might surprise you!

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