Costco Just Lowered Prices On Several Essential Grocery Items
If your Costco bills haven't been quite as high as usual lately, those savings weren't necessarily a random stroke of luck. The retailer just announced that it has reduced prices on several essential grocery items as inflation slows but remains a point of concern for consumers in the United States.
Costco just released its earnings results for its second financial quarter of 2024 and subsequently discussed the data with investors on a March 7 call. Outgoing Costco CFO Richard Galanti revealed during the call that they've been "taking price reductions where we can," including for products like batteries, reading glasses, beverages, and frozen fruit.
Specifically, Galanti said that Costco has lowered prices for 48-count packs of Kirkland Signature batteries from $17.99 to $15.99 and reduced prices for reading glasses from $18.99 to $16.99. Meanwhile, 24-count packs of San Pellegrino water dropped from $16.99 to $14.99, and four-pound bags of frozen fruit dropped from $14.99 to $10.99.
Galanti added that many new sporting goods and lawn and garden items will also have lower prices in 2024 compared to last year.
These price reductions come as the rampant inflation from the past few years is gradually slowing, but elevated costs continue to impact consumers. Prices increased 0.3% between this past December and January and they were 3.1% higher in the first month of 2024 compared to a year prior, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Food in particular has been eating up a major chunk of Americans' budgets. The Wall Street Journal, citing USDA data, recently reported that consumers spent 11.3% of their disposable incomes on food in 2022. Americans haven't spent so much of their disposable incomes on food since 1991 (11.4%).
However, Costco wants to give its members a little extra breathing room with the recent price decreases.
"We always want to be the first out there trying to lower prices," Galanti said.
The product price reductions weren't the only major Costco news to come out of the March 7 earnings call. Galanti also revealed that the company still isn't rolling out the membership fee increase it has been teasing for more than a year. He said that he's "sure" the company will raise its membership fees "at some point," but customers will have to keep waiting for more concrete details on the timing of the fee hike for now.
Costco also plans to expand the fresh Kirkland Signature sushi—which launched last year at its Issaquah, Wash., warehouse—to two more locations in the near future. Additionally, the retailer will roll out the highly-requested inventory lookup feature it has been promising since 2023 in about a few months, Galanti said.
Sign up for our newsletter!
