Sam's Club or Costco Membership?

Well, I said I was going to discuss this later, but I didn't know it would be so soon.

Ran into this article posted on Yahoo! but originally from SmartMoney.com that compares some of the commonly purchased items at regular grocery stores vs. BJs, Costco, and Sam's Club. Read at your convenience.

Here are the big reasons why our Family goes to Sam's Club.

• Expanded hours for business club members. Starts at 7:00 AM. At this time, they have things such as danishes, muffins, cinnamon rolls, and coffee for those who shop that early. If the kids are with me, they get to eat as well.
• Way less crowds during the above times.
• Costco has "business" hours, but it is the same time as the regular public hours.
• Click 'n pull (or Fax 'n pull). I haven't used this service, but if I ran a restaurant or other retail business, I would be using this all the time. You can place orders beforehand and they'll pull all the items and place them on a cart for you. Talking about a timesaver.
• They take any MasterCard. Compared to Costco where they take American Express (steep annual fee). It's easier for me to place purchases on my MasterCard and pay it off in full at the end of the statement period.
• Sam's Club Gas Stations take MasterCard. Costco requires ATM or American Express.
• Sam's Club is slightly closer to my house and work (not a really good reason), and is also closer to the BestBuy store (not a really good reason either).

Since we're in California, there aren't any BJs around this area.

The only reason why I personally go to Costco is the once a year coupon to save on TurboTax. I think between my family and myself, we go to Costco less than 5 times per year. So this year we actually decided to not renew our Costco Membership. Costco actually sent me another coupon booklet even though we aren't members. I think they were trying to see if we would renew based on the coupon booklet offers. Not right now....