Costco dogs aren’t too expensive for these civil servants:
They can raise the price of the membership card if the hot dog is really getting more expensive.
Those two things are loss leaders but it brings in people who would not come in other wise.
People come in just to let their kids ride the penny pony and get a cone. But since they are there anyway.....
Getting them in the store is the hard part. Sure you will have a few that will just enjoy your loss leader and leave but a good 95% of the people coming in will buy other things.
Costco Hot Dogs are the best.
My wife is a shopper...and not in a good way.
It is physically impossible for her to run into a store to buy a specific item. No matter what is on her list when she goes in, there is considerably more in her cart going out. It has gotten to the point that when the budget is tight, she is not allowed to do the shopping.
Costco is the worst. We will be going in for coffee (their bag of espresso beans is excellent and a great bargain) and toilet paper and somehow have $400 worth of “stuff we need” in our basket at checkout.
As for the food counter...we always comment on getting some on the way out, but after emptying our checking account, we rarely do. They do sell the uncooked hotdogs (next to the bacon in our location) and they are a good value.