The Ledger
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Costco has never conducted an employee layoff in its corporate history
“The company has never done a layoff.”
Costco has grown revenue roughly 10% annually for over 30 years
“Costco has grown revenue right about 10% for over 30 years in a row.”
Membership fees historically account for 70% of Costco's operating income
“It is accurate to say that membership fees represent about 70% of the company's operating income, with the other 30% of the profit margins coming from retail. It's been a little bit more than 30% in recent years, but that's sort of the historical split.”
Costco maintains a remarkably low 7% workforce attrition rate after year one
“After the first year, Costco today has only a seven percent attrition rate among their workforce.”
Costco has decreased its warehouse SKU count to just 3,800 items
“Costco in the last 10 years was around 4500, and then they sort of looked and said, can we bring it down and went to 4000? And today they're sitting at 3800. So this number is still going down, not up.”
The typical Costco shopper earns $125,000, roughly 70% above the US median
“There was an independent research firm that found that the typical Costco consumer makes about a 125,000 dollars a year in household income and has a four-year degree. Walmart, by comparison, has a median income of about 80,000 dollars. And keep in mind, the m…”
A $10,000 investment in Costco's 1985 IPO generated a 330x return by 2023
“If you bought 10,000 dollars of shares in their IPO in 1985, you would have 3.3 million dollars today, a 330 X, and this does not include the dividends you would have earned along the way, which they've actually done a lot of dividends, including four-ish spec…”
Costco sells 130 million hot dogs globally each year
“They also sell a hundred and thirty million of them per year.”
Walmart operates at 24% gross margins, between Costco's 13% and Target's 30%
“If you look at Walmart's twenty-four-ish percent gross margin, so that's basically what they get from the goods that they sell on the shelf, you see, ok, it's less than Target, which makes 29 30% of anything that they sell on the shelf. Well, Costco's gross pr…”