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Robert A. Mills

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Blogs by Robert A. Mills

SHOP TIL YOU FLOP
8/17/2009 3:49:08 PM

We’ve been members of BJ’s Discount Warehouse Club since we lived in Rochester, NY, back in the Dark Ages (D.A.—Dreaming of Alex.) For a few years, after abandoning the frozen tundra for the land of peanuts and sunshine, we also joined Costco’s (it was near my office before I retired, and frankly, I preferred it —and still do—over BJ’s.) There was a time, for a few months, when we also did business with Sam’s, and Chris and Alex remain loyal to them even now.

Which one is the best, when it comes to prices and selection? Sadly, none of them—or they all are, depending on you, your budget, your geographic peculiarity and your shopping savvy.

Ironically, the last—savvy—is the most important, albeit highly subjective, ranging in value from family to family and shopper to shopper. But it is the key to warehouse club shopping success.

All of them charge a membership fee, ranging from $40 on up, and that is their greatest profit center. Yours, however, is using your brain and good old American common sense. Plus some ready tools:

A shopping list. Never enter your warehouse store without a well-thought-out shopping list. And stick to it, come hell or high water. No impulse buying, no matter how attractive the item or your sudden belief you cannot live without it. (As in all stores, avoid the use of a shopping cart, if possible. Shopping carts account for 73% of all impulse purchases!)

Cut, collect, and use coupons (BJ’s even lets you use manufacturer’s coupons.) You can save as much as $38 a month. I know, I know. Coupons are so pedestrian—you’re so far above that! Get real.

Join a club that has a gas station (nearly all do.) Savings will average 4 to 7 cents a gallon over what is available to non-members at so-called “cut-rate stations."

Aside from gasoline, if there’s a Walmart Super Center more convenient, save the membership fee and forget the membership clubs. The per unit prices may be a penny or two more, but the quantity you go home with makes more sense—unless you’re in the market for a flat screen TV or a brand-name computer. Or you have a family of thirteen kids or own a restaurant (if you have thirteen kids, maybe you should own a restaurant. Or a drug store.)

The quality of food items at Walmart or Target’s Archer Farms is, for the most part, as good as, if not better than, any of the membership clubs. There are, however, pockets of exceptions such as BJ’s rotisserie chickens and Costco’s fresh salmon. Sam’s produce is often superlative.
All of the membership clubs sell jewelry, cosmetics, furniture, clothing, books, seasonal items, optics, pharmaceuticals, paper products, laundry and kitchen needs, toys and pet supplies—you name, they got it. But so does Target, Walmart, Penny’s, Sears, etc. It all boils down to what you actually need, what you want, what you can store and what you can afford—and where you should go to make your purchases that is most convenient and cost effective.

Even in these economic doldrums, if it weren’t for the membership fees the warehouse clubs impose, the would win hands down--but that one requirement levels the playing field. Of course, if you truly believe membership has its privileges, it becomes academic: forget about shopping lists, carts and coupons. Shop ‘til you flop.

Last of the Critical Question Answers:

Fourteen punctuation marks in English grammar.
Period, comma, colon, semicolon, dash, hyphen, apostrophe, Question
mark, exclamation point, quotation marks, brackets, Parenthesis, braces, and
ellipses.

The only vegetable or fruit never sold frozen, canned, Processed, cooked, or in any other form but fresh.
Lettuce.

Six or more things you can wear on your feet beginning with 'S'
Shoes, socks, sandals, sneakers, slippers, skis, skates, Snowshoes, stockings,
stilts.

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