Funny enough I had a friend in Revelstoke do a road trip to Calgary a few years back just to hit Costco on my membership and that is about a 3 hour drive and damn did he ever splurgeAll told he spent $1500.Whilst going through the store he started loading in the strip loin steaks whilst saying "what a bargain"....I then pointed out the WHOLE striploins and said "30 minutes of work per piece and you get the same thing but for far less".....out go the trays of steaks and into the cart go a couple of striploins.....he opted for premium toilet paper and I said "so you like wiping your ass with money huh?.....out with the premium and on with the Kirkland brand.After about 15 minutes he started to get smart.All told he stuffed his F-150 crew cab that had a canopy to the gills and he got everything you can think of.He saw the 3 packs of bread for $6.95 and bought 6 of them and the same for the bagels.Throw in a couple of 5 kilo boxes of perogies as well as multiple packs of the all beef weiners as well as the bacon and he also bought a couple of industrial sized boxes of tampons as he was shacked up with a GF who had 2 teenaged daughters.He also bought roasts etc for beef and a couple of those long pork tenderloins but shied away from seafood as well as the fancy stuff such as the racks of lamb.
That haul lasted him and the GF with 2 teenagers 3 MONTHS whilst eating like kings....I asked him what it would have cost to buy it in Revelstoke(and keeping in mind the meat would not be as good) and he said it would have cost $4500 and for less quality product.Hell if I still lived in Revelstoke I would do the 3 hour road trip as well considering a lousy 450 gram loaf of bread costs $6 and a mediocre steak costs $15 and the expiration dates on both run maybe for 4 days.
SR
.....and that is the problem with living in, or near small interior towns. Your lucky to get the produce home before it goes bad.
Hell I've seen them try to sell milk products that are 3 days overdue, and last week I saw mandarin oranges on for 2 bucks a box......if you could get them to the cashier because the boxes were deteriorating so bad from the juices running out of them.
They even place red tags over shit saying SALE.........if you turn up that red tag, you'll realize that it's the same full price, because they are to lazy to pull the old price tag still sitting underneath.
I find its more than worth it to drive the 3 hours to get to a larger urban centre......just so my cucumbers last for more than 3 days, and my pizza doesn't taste bad from week old mushrooms.
I've walked out carrying three bags of groceries and spent a hundred bucks, just to have half of it go bad, and attract bears into my yard, because I have to throw it out....meanwhile I'll spend 300 at superstore and it'll last me a month.