Walmart’s Costo and Sam’s Club offer similar shopping experiences and in many markets are located close to each other.
Both chains are fighting for every possible advantage. Costco carries the Kirkland Signature brand, which might be the most trusted house brand in the country, but Sam’s Club may actually have cheaper prices.
“In 2023, AARP investigated the prices of 30 comparable food items at each chain and found that in their sample, Sam’s Club food was about 18.36% cheaper than Costco by weight. Some of the items they compared included rotisserie chicken, wild salmon fillets, baked beans, mayo, rice and oranges, juices, pasta, mayo, rice and oranges, juice, pasta, TheStreet’s Jeremy Salvucci.
In the same article, he also found that Sam’s Club has another price advantage over Costco.
“The product lines of the two stores are sometimes comparable in price, but when they are not, Sam’s Club’s Member’s Mark products are usually less expensive than their Kirkland Signature counterparts“, he wrote.
Costco and Sam’s Club each have about 600 warehouse clubs in the United States. Walmart doesn’t report Sam’s Club membership numbers, so it’s impossible to know which chain has more members.
It’s fair to say, though, that each company works hard to deliver a better experience than its very similar rival. Sam’s Club’s latest move, you could argue, may give it an edge over Costco.
While Costco has been testing some new checkout experiences that will speed up its lines, Sam’s Club has already made a massive improvement to its checkout offering.
Sam’s Club has made significant progress in rolling out technology that solves a key member problem – waiting in line for check-in to leave the club.
The retailer’s first-of-its-kind application of artificial intelligence and computer vision technology has been successfully deployed in more than 120 clubs since its unveiling at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January.
Since the update, Sam’s Club has added the technology to all of its US warehouses.
“In clubs where the technology has been implemented, more than half of members enjoy a frictionless exit experience. This translates into all members leaving the club 23 percent faster,” the company said in a press release.
Sam’s Club also plans to eliminate traditional checkout lines.
“Traditional checkouts will be replaced with a system known as Scan & Go, which allows members to scan products with the store’s app and complete their purchases directly from their phones,” according to Payments Journal.
This new update adds a layer of artificial intelligence (AI) to the payment process.
“An AI scanner checks merchandise as customers leave, eliminating the need for receipt checks at the door. Because Sam’s Club operates under a subscription model, theft is not as much of a concern as it would be at a Walmart flagship store,” the company said.
This is good for consumers – if it works. A retail expert provided more details in an email to Customer Experience Dive, as cited by Retail Dive.
It defeats the purpose if a worker has to be involved in the process.
“Most of these friction points involve excessive interaction with a salesperson, which is designed to eliminate self-cancellation,” Alloy added.
Costco has also been working on speeding up checkout, but uses a more manual approach.
“Progress has already begun and is delivering tangible results. In the warehouse, the implementation of inbound subscription scanning, Costco’s digital wallet and pre-scanning of small and mid-sized baskets is leading to a better experience for members and improved productivity,” CEO Ron Vachris said during the chain’s first-quarter earnings call.
More retail:
The results, he noted, were positive.
“Warehouses that first adopted this prescanning technology have shown improvements in checkout completion speed of up to 20%. And overall, in our US warehouses, [we] reached record levels of productivity at the checkout in the final weeks of the quarter,” he said.
As a Costco member for the better part of the last 30 years, I thoroughly dislike having someone check my receipt when I leave the store. I don’t relish the implication that I might be stealing and find the process slightly offensive.
Also, I don’t enjoy waiting in line, so any effort to speed up the check-out process is appreciated.
Related: Rival Mexican chain Chipotle has closed all its restaurants
“Self-service has become an essential retail feature, but good self-service is more elusive. Companies have made significant strides in recent years to increase the availability of self-service kiosks and other unattended payment options,” according to PYMNTS.com.
The payments publication also shared some other key auto payment statistics.
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Eighty-four percent of US consumers are happy self-service kioskswith 66% preferring them over staffed homes.
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Eighty-one percent of consumers surveyed said they wanted to more self-service options at the businesses they frequent.
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Quantity alone is not enough, as 36% said they want smarter unattended payment options.
Self-checkout is becoming a retail standard, according to data from Capital One’s Shopping Research, which shared some other facts:
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75.4% of self-checkout kiosks are installed in retail stores.
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96% of grocery stores offers self-checkout.
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Early estimates indicate that 10,000 merchants worldwide have installed self-checkout systems starting in 2024.
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Projections indicate that by 2030, over 24,000 stores will provide self-checkout.
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In 2023, 217,000 new self-checkout terminals were delivered to stores worldwide, up 12% from 2022.
“The North American home automation market deserves an estimate 2.28 billion dollars from 2024; projections indicate it will exceed 5 billion dollars by 2030,” Capital One added.
Consumers want automation, but they also want to see improved technology, according to a survey by NMI.
“Most consumers want more self-service opportunities, but they also expect a better user experience. When self-service payments work seamlessly, they represent extreme convenience – one of the most important factors driving consumers’ choice of payment.”
“But when it doesn’t work, especially in completely unsupervised environments with no on-site help available, the customer is effectively powerless, creating a highly negative experience,” the study says.
Related: Costco improves member benefits amid slowing growth
This story was originally published by TheStreet on January 2, 2026, where it first appeared in the Retail section. Add TheStreet as a favorite source by clicking here.