A customer loads a pickup truck after shopping at a Costco store in Richmond, California, on July 11.
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Are you craving that $1.50 hot dog and soda combo from Costco? Please be sure to bring your own membership card with you.
The retail giant announced that in the coming months, shoppers will have to start scanning their membership cards at Costco warehouse entrances instead of just showing them to store employees.
The Washington-based company is the latest to crack down on membership sharing as businesses try to prevent consumers from using the premium accounts of friends and family without paying for the membership themselves.
Costco members with an active membership must scan their physical or digital card at a machine at the store entrance. Members with a membership card without a photo must present a valid photo ID, and guests can only enter Costco stores with a valid membership.
“If you have any questions or concerns, there’s always an attendant at the door to help!” Costco said in a statement.
Costco isn’t the only company preventing some consumers from free riding. Disney recently announced that it would begin preventing Disney+ account holders from sharing their passwords with streaming services outside of their home.
Similar steps taken by Netflix last year led to an increase in subscribers but may also have hurt the company’s reputation. fast company reported.
Costco executive Richard Galanti told MarketWatch in January that the company’s goal was to prevent non-members from evading fees by using their loyalty cards to make purchases, an issue that arose after the company rolled out self-checkout lanes of.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when people were asking others to shop for them to avoid going out, Costco relaxed its enforcement of the rules, Galanti said.
To address the issue, the company announced that it will begin requiring customers in self-checkout lines to show their membership card and photo ID, in addition to regular checkout lines.
Costco has 128 million members and reported $4.6 billion in membership fee revenue last year.
Costco’s annual membership fees will increase starting in September, from $60 to $65 for Gold Star members and from $120 to $130 for Executive members.
