- January visits to club stores are up 7% from last year — double the increases for Walmart and Target.
- The strong start accelerates 2024’s trend as buying in bulk gets more popular.
- US shoppers are increasingly looking for the best deals and great experiences at warehouse stores.
The hottest club in town might be your local warehouse store.
January visits to Costco, Sam’s Club, and BJ’s were up more than 7% from last year, according to foot traffic data from Placer.ai. That’s double the increases for Walmart and Target.
“It’s a continuation of 2024,” Kantar retail analyst Gina Logan told Business Insider.
Club store visits significantly outpaced those of Target and Walmart in each of the prior six months, according to Placer.ai’s data, with the warehouse chains seeing big gains for the full year of 2024 compared to 2023.
Logan said that while inflation likely drove a lot of that bulk-buying popularity, several other forces have entered the chat this year, including weather, tariffs, and bird flu.
“The same kind of logic applies to the retailers front-loading, and I think that people are stocking up in advance as well,” she said. “Costco and Sam’s and BJ’s are where you’re going to get the lowest price per unit.”
Not only are the prices often the best in town, warehouse chains also boast some of the best experiences, according to shoppers — and they’re getting better.
Costco has long been the gold standard in terms of customer satisfaction across retail, but this year Sam’s Club managed to snatch the top spot in the annual American Consumer Satisfaction Index rankings.
“They’re really looking into things that will draw people to come to the club,” Logan said, highlighting Costco’s treasure hunt and new jumbo cookie, BJ’s success in fresh foods and grocery, and Sam’s Club’s tech-enabled member experience.
At the same time, Logan said shoppers are increasingly looking to make the most of their annual membership fee — which has gotten more expensive — and choosing clubs more frequently than the monthly stock-up.
“They’re becoming more of a routine and becoming more ingrained in people’s shopping routines than before,” she said.
The traffic gains are translating to respectable sales growth as well, according to an analysis from Morgan Stanley’s retail team. Club stores saw 6.8% monthly sales growth in January, slightly ahead of off-price retailers and behind the dollar store and athleisure categories.
What makes the estimated top-line gains even more notable is that the club stores have been working to bring prices down, which means they have to sell even more stuff to beat the prior period’s inflation-boosted numbers.
Official quarterly and annual results will begin to come in on Thursday when Walmart reports earnings for Sam’s Club, while BJ’s and Costco report in two weeks.
The numbers suggest that club stores are giving customers a strong bang for their buck, and the foot-traffic data shows customers are coming back more often.
