An interesting article about Costco wages VS Wal-Mart, target etc. Doesn't point a finger of blame, just explains some of the factors involved.
Well written IMO and interesting.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...ke-costco.html
One of the many points I was not aware of.
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One final thing that's worth pointing out is that Costco doesn't even make money selling the groceries and the six person hot-tubs. Their annual membership fee revenue exceeds their net profit--which is to say that the actual business of selling stuff is operating at a loss. They're charging you an annual fee to buy stuff at or near cost. That's a model that works really well with their basically affluent customer base, and not incidentally, a model that allows you to worry a bit less about your cost of sales. Sam's Club tries to do the same thing, but caters to a lower-income clientele and makes a lot less money despite having more stores.
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Costco's higher revenues are also a function of their demographic. Costco shoppers have an average income of $85,000--not surprising, because Costco tends to locate itself in affluent suburbs. Walmart shoppers are what the firm calls "value driven shoppers" which is to say, there's not a lot of spare money lying around the house, just waiting for an opportunity to buy a 6-lb wheel of Camembert. Value driven are very price conscious, and willing to forgoe things like service or artful displays in order to shave an extra 50 cents off the weekly shaving cream budget. If you've been wondering why Walmart seems serenely unworried that last Friday's labor action will touch of a boycott, this is why. If you took all the people in my twitter feed expressing excitement about a new era of labor organizing last Friday, I'd be very surprised to learn that they had spent as much as a thousand dollars between all of them at a Walmart last year.
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Helen