Costco has been regarded as a great place to purchase a television. It offers shoppers a curated selection of high-quality screens that are usually more affordable than similar products found at outlets like Walmart and Best Buy. Costco can sell more affordable TVs because it buys in bulk. Hardly a surprise — buying in bulk is one of the company’s core strategies. Consequently, Costco can secure favorable pricing on a per-unit basis and then pass on those cost savings to consumers. It can also negotiate with suppliers to provide additional features on certain TV sets without a huge price increase. “We meet with our suppliers multiple times a year,” Costco TV buyer Michelle Hartmann said in an interview a few years ago. “Our goal is always to negotiate upgraded specs, additional warranties or streaming credits with popular services such as Paramount+, Showtime and Xbox, to add value for our members.”
Additionally, because consumers don’t purchase new TV sets regularly, pricing them aggressively is a smart way to get shoppers through the door, where it can later make money on other electronics, along with higher-margin but more affordable items like clothes and groceries. As a final point, some of the TVs at the retailer are Costco-specific models that can’t be found elsewhere. This gives the company room to lower prices without having to worry about rival stores undercutting it or launching a price-matching war.
Costco makes most of its money from memberships
Costco’s real revenue comes from memberships. This is why the company can sell TVs at a markedly lower price point than outlets like Best Buy, which needs to make money on each set sold. During Costco’s 2025 fiscal year, for example, the company generated $5.3 billion in revenue from membership fees alone. In other words, Costco doesn’t need to hike up the prices on TV sets to generate significant revenue. Consequently, pricing TV competitively helps make the value of a Costco membership even more appealing. Not only does it attract prospective new members, but it also helps to solidify the company’s overall brand as a place where there are good deals to be had, even on relatively pricey items.
Suffice it to say, if you’re in the market for a brand-new TV, you might want to make Costco your first and only stop. The TV buying experience can be overwhelming. Just walking through that section at Best Buy, for example, provides consumers with a seemingly endless selection of brands, sizes, and picture quality options. And that’s to say nothing of the vast gap in pricing across different models. While affordable HDTVs, like select TCL models, can be found in the $300 range, more advanced models from companies like Samsung can easily cost upward of $3,000. That being the case, Costco offering TVs at more affordable prices simplifies what could otherwise be a complex buying decision.
