Six Unusual Ways to Save at Club Stores

Those of us who belong to club stores (FYI, I get my Costco membership paid for by my employer as a very nice perk) know that if you shop them correctly you can save a good amount on a whole host of food-related products. But Smart Money lists six other ways to save that you may not have considered as follows:

• Gasoline
• Electronics
• Financial Services
• Insurance
• Tickets
• Cars

Here's my take on these:

• We gas up frequently when we're at Costco because the prices are several cents below other stations in the area (I can see prices at any moment via GasBuddy on my phone). That said, we do the math since sometimes it's better to pay "more" elsewhere but ultimately save once credit card rewards are considered.


• We got our TV as well as our last computer at Costco. Both were great buys and Costco added a year on to the manufacturer's warranty (not that we needed either one.)


• The savings rates they quoted in the piece seem good, but I think I can do better with my own online bank and can certainly do better with my credit union.


• I never really thought about Costco for insurance. I'll need to include them the next time I price out my car insurance.


• We don't really buy that many tickets.


• I think I can do better on a car by using my method (FYI, here's how I did on my most recent purchase.) Besides, there's "entertainment value" in the process for me. ;-)

How about you? Anyone use club stores to save in any of these areas?

Comments

[Matt]

Gas all the time, some electronics, The others I have not really looked into.

[Elle]

We save big with Ameriprise through Costsco. It cut our premiums down in half and we have more coverage than we did before.

[Money Beagle]

Now that we have an American Express card (as an offshoot of our Citi Dividends cashback card), we just started buying gas at Costco. We will probably only get 25-30% of our gas there, as it's not worth it to go out of the way so it'll only happen when we do a 'regular' shopping trip, but that will still help somewhat in savings and in cashback rewards.

[Nikki]

Definitely gas! I use gift cards at Wal-Mart or find a friend with a Sam's Club card to save some money. I bought my laptop and printer from Sam's Club. They had the best deals on electronics at the time. Other than that I haven't ever looked into anything else.

[Marc B]

The problem I have with purchasing gas at Costco is the cost of my own time. On average, gas is approximately $0.05 per gallon cheaper. My car holds 15 gallons, but a usual fillup is about 12-13 gallons. That's a saving of $0.65, with a maximum of $0.75. Now, while I don't know what the lines are like at the Costcos near you, the one near me takes approximately 20-30 minutes to fill up. Is 30 minutes of my day really worth saving $0.75?

On the other hand, if I go to my regular station, my fillups usually run in the vicinity of $55.00. If I use my cash back credit card, 1% back would give me $0.55.

When you factor in time and overall savings, IMO, filling up elsewhere is the better way to go!