Paul Daniel's Views On The World, For What They're Worth

Lord knows I hate shopping, crowds and being out in the heat. So it was with some trepidation that, ignoring all three of these issues, we headed off to Costco this morning.

Now I know I’m not exactly on the leading edge here. Early adoption isn’t really me, although I did apply for my myki yesterday. Many of my colleagues have already made the trek. But I generally put them into the categories of:

1. Families with children who probably spend many hundreds of dollars a week on groceries and who are looking to save as much as they can, as soon as they can; and
2. Americans who can’t let go. 😉

(Adam, I’m not sure where that leaves you. I guess you’re a de facto American. Right?)

My objective was to work out whether Mr & Mrs Mature, who don’t fit into either category above, would get the benefit. A natural concern was that I had to part with $55 for a membership just to get in the door (yep, having an ABN saved me $5). I have to secretly admit (I guess it’s no secret anymore, is it?) that I really wanted the experience to be so crap that we would never ever contemplate doing it again, and would write the $55 off as a bad investment.

So, the verdict:

1. The car park is way too small – how did Melbourne City let them get away with that?
2. The registration process was straight forward – albeit a bit time consuming. If I’d have been more organised, I would have done it on the web. I could have then run a book on which would turn up first, my Costco card or my myki card. Opening odds: Costco – 1/10. myki – 33/1.
3. Prices for a lot of the non-grocery items don’t seem to be particularly cheap. Indeed, I thought some of the stuff was quite expensive. 46″ TV similar to the one we paid $1,300 for was $1,700. Having said that, $20 for 6 pairs of high-quality sports socks was very good. (Darling, do you really need 6 more pairs of sports socks?)
4. Grocery items were clearly about 60% to 70% of what they are in the supermarket. One just needs to be judicious in terms of the bulk buy thing. (Darling, do we really need 12 tins of baked beans?)
5. The checkout process was very efficient.
6. The crowds were terrible, but bearable.
7. It’s air conditioned. Nice!
8. There’s probably sufficient benefit for Mr & Mrs Mature from Mordialloc to persevere with it, so that’s a begrudging thumbs up.

What’s the worst part of it? Carol’s decided the best way for us to Costco is for her to give me a list every month or so and I can head in there after work. Hang on. What about my hatred of shopping? The heat? The crowds?

Sigh!!!!!!!