For the typical personal (non-business) customer, Costco's biggest strengths have always been:<p>- The ability to get a large bulk of a middle-class family's share of once-every-few-weeks shopping done in one go: bulk sizes, wide span of stock from grocery to home goods, apparel, electronics, entertainment<p>- Curation: no need to vacillate about which ketchup to pick<p>- Suprise items you didn't know you needed until you see it; enabled by curation<p>- Strong store brand offerings; enables curation<p>In the age of delivery, bulk shopping a filled cart of goods at a physical store is becoming a liability rather than a strength. But Amazon has terrible curation and is much newer at store-brand merchandise. They're just now easing into higher-value items.
Costco launching delivery service. Is this end of Costco. Will this decrease their store foot traffic? I think so. As they say, disrupt yourself before someone disrupts you. Costco knew Amazon is coming after them.