Costco is a membership-only warehouse club that provides a wide selection of merchandise.
Costco Wholesale Corporation, doing business as Costco, is an American multinational corporation which operates a chain of membership-only warehouse clubs. As of 2015, Costco was the second largest retailer in the world after Walmart, and as of 2016, Costco was the world’s largest retailer of choice and prime beef, organic foods, rotisserie chicken, and wine. As of 2019, Costco is ranked #14 on the Fortune 500 rankings of the largest United States corporations by total revenue.
Costco’s worldwide headquarters are in Issaquah, Washington, a suburb east of Seattle; the company opened its first warehouse (the chain’s term for its retail outlets) in Seattle 37 years ago in 1983. Through mergers, Costco’s corporate history dates back to 1976, when its former competitor Price Club was founded in San Diego, California. As of December 31, 2019, Costco has a total of 785 warehouses: 546 in the United States and Puerto Rico, 100 in Canada, 39 in Mexico, 29 in the United Kingdom, 26 in Japan, 16 in South Korea, 13 in Taiwan, 11 in Australia, two in Spain, one in Iceland, one in France, and one in China. Costco is scheduled to open a warehouse in New Zealand in 2021.
Merchandise, Cash & Carry, Warehouse club
Over the past three years, Costco has gained momentum, benefiting from trends such as increased home cooking, millennials moving into larger suburban homes, and inflation driving shoppers to seek value through memberships at warehouse clubs.
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Despite the record revenue during the past quarter and year, the company is experiencing challenges in market shifts.