People of Costco

Leave a Comment / By Paul Hughes / December 12, 2012

We got some of our Christmas presents at Costco and I’m not sorry. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of volume discounting, for it is the confidence of 30 rolls of absorbent toilet paper and the power of barrels of mayonnaise unto certain kinds of satiation, and two items not unrelated in the end.

But, no, we didn’t buy Best Foods or Bounty to stuff stockings.

But, yes, we are People of Costco.

People of Costco are like People of Walmart, but the former chant quality and they can afford a stuffed animal that were it real and actually that size, would glee and claw my family to death in our sleep. And being able to buy stuff in those ways covers a multitude of sins.

But, no, we didn’t get you a stuffed dragon.

But, yes, the two People groups are alike.

The one (we’ll call them They) might look around Walmart and not see lots of it is unneeded and crap, or realize that “As Seen on TV” isn’t a selling point.

We look around Costco and don’t say look at all this friggin’ food, or realize we needn’t carry inventory on Kleenex.

People of Walmart and People of Costco both shop on price, buy to fill needs and wants real and illusory, and do things that change the face, hands, hearts, and feet of entire communities.

Both groups are shoppers in need, and the need is not three cases of Gatorade.

Costco shoppers still block the aisles and our carts are bigger.

We all still spend what we might more profitably save or share.

Just as there has to be a better way than “As Seen on TV,” there has to be a better way than look at all this friggin’ food.

“People of … ” are everywhere. People of Facebook are just Walmart shoppers who not only talk to you, but expect you to like that thing they just said. Disdain for “People of Walmart” says more about us than them, as disdain does.

Jesus would shop at Walmart. Might not buy much — soap, maybe, or t-shirts — but he’d hang. They are his peeps. But he’d send Judas to Costco. That dude always had an eye for deals.

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