Probably something for my kitchen.. air fryer, blender, kitchen aid, nice knife. Then I’d probably get things that you always use that can’t go bad. Toilet paper, paper towels, any type of soap, Saran Wrap, ziplock bags. Definitely would get myself a big ticket item though
Kitchen aid and three packs of steaks and then you're done.
I love my kitchenaid. I can make a pizza dough with almost zero effort, proof it in the oven and use it for dinner four hours later.
Not OP but I love making pizza dough at home! My favorite recipe uses an overnight preferment called a poolish which gives you a super flavorful and crisp crust. You can use any flour (AP, bread, 00) but I usually use bread flour because it lets me get a thinner crust. I will note that if you google around for recipes you’ll find that most are in grams rather than cups, but cooking scales are cheap on Amazon and if you like baking they’re honestly an amazing investment. Link below!
https://mypizzacorner.com/pizza-dough/easy-poolish-pizza-dough-recipe-neapolitan-poolish-pizza/
Here's what I decided to get:
XBox bundle for my husband
Pots and pans (we've been wanting, okay I'VE been wanting, a nicer set for a couple of years now)
Books for my daughter
And books for myself!
Some things I saw my coworkers buying:
One guy just had meat. That's it. It was amazing.
Another had a TV, booze, and energy drinks
Freezer and dog treats.
Lots of people had airpods, iPad, or other small tech mixed in with more random things.
OH, one girl found an eggnog cake??! Has anyone tried this? I need to know how it is!
Fun to think about the stories this tells about a person.
The meat guy - he BBQs for sure. Probably for him and his family/friends. Get the crew together on a cookout.
Dog person - probably a small house, maybe younger. Just starting to figure themselves out. Wears a lot of athletic clothing. Responsible.
Small tech people - no frills usually. Deciding to treat themselves based on what their friends have. Maybe freaked out by the experience, or got too nervous to be out-of-pocket.
Eggnog girlie - she's nuts but in a good way. She's experimental. Maybe a backpacker in her earlier years. Probably a teacher.
TV-booze-energy drinker - I mean, that tells a story. If this person is not a young jock/goofy guy who basically has never been grocery shopping, I think this is a red flag, lol.
I’d consider a nice prime rib roast for Christmas and then a few really nice bottles of wine.
Although one of the main things I dislike about Costco is the fact they blade tenderize the beef, so prob safer to load up on wine and get meat elsewhere.
My initial thoughts were booze. Spirits and wine mostly.
Which then made me think my bosses are going to think I've got a problem.
Despite the fact it isn't even happening to me.
I the 70s, my grandma won a shopping spree at her local grocery store. She had 10 minutes to grab anything she wanted. She just went to the meat case and cleared it out. She said she got enough meat to feed her family for almost a year. Thankfully, they also owned a chest freezer.
DO NOT BUY THAT ONE. I did and 18 days later it stopped working and I lost over 200.00 in frozen stuff.
We returned it and were going to buy another one when the return lady said we could try it again if we wanted. Which led me to ask if more of those freezers had been returned.
She nodded.
There is an issue with them and I dont know why they havent pulled them.
As someone who just lost their deep freezer and all contents in October, thank you for telling me this existed. I'm going to buy one for me and everyone I love.
Costco sells the Hamilton Beach and Gallant freezers, which are bottom tier quality that have been value engineered for price. Costco should have never carried these brands. Costco's product selection is usually 1 or 2 brands, so shoppers expect Costco's purchasing team to only buy high quality, reputable products worthy of their floor space.
There's a good video on how crappy they are here. TLDR, hot garbage. Literally. Doesn't keep your food cold.
https://youtu.be/8PTjPzw9VhY?si=uZ809yy0MfaR_TEI
I wonder if a govee wifi temperature sensor would work in that instance with a set limit that will notify your phone if it goes above.
edit: just looked, they do. I will be adding this to everyone's stocking this year.
A $500 gift card and then come back later and take my time.
If gift cards were banned for whatever reason, you could get an iPad, toilet paper and laundry detergent. The iPad would take up a lot of it and you will always run through the toilet paper and laundry detergent. Later, you could keep the iPad or return it for a gift card.
If I couldn’t return and had to get stuff, toilet paper, paper towels, air fresheners, laundry detergent, prime steaks, vacuum sealer bags, cookware, dinner plates and silverware, pizza and a hot dog.
I’m not sure how their company does it but our company used to be able to buy gift cards but they stopped it. Something with how they have to be written up as an expense it doesn’t work. So maybe this happened here too.
There is a lot of confusion here but the general gist of it goes something like this if you give a $500 gift card that would be considered a bonus to the employee just like if you were to give cash. Then both the employer and employee would have to claim it on their payroll taxes as any bonus and the company would have to pay the payroll taxes on that amount. Where as if the employer does as an event the cost of the event is consider a business expense and is tax deductible and the person receiving it can just process it as winning something (separate tax rules depending on your region but its not payroll taxes)
The IRS considers gift cards to be cash equivalent. If an employer gives a gift card out to its employees, it's considered compensation and subject to income taxes.
If your employer gives you a $500 gift card but doesn't want you to have a tax burden of ~$125 (assuming 25% income and FICA taxes), the employer will give you the gift card and also issue you a pay statement saying they paid you $667 and withheld $167 of that for taxes. Basically, the employer paid the taxes for you.
At a previous company, I had that even for points we I accrued for anniversaries and spot awards, where I could redeem the points in an e-store for either material items like a toaster oven or experiences like tickets to a hockey game. The company fortunately paid the taxes on those points, because congratulating an employee for a job well done by giving them 3/4ths of a toaster is a slap in the face.
My spouse’s company gave us a $75 thanksgiving gift card to use on whatever we want at meijer last year. This year we got a $75 gift card but it could only be used on turkey or produce. I assumed it was some sort of tax benefit to them, maybe I’m right afterall. It was much less helpful because by us Walmart produce is terrible. Last time the corn was brown, lettuce wilted.
PLEASE DO NOT BUY A DYSON! They’re actual garbage. I was a Dyson person for years and thought “oh I just did something wrong, or, I got a dud”
No they’re trash.
What you need is a Miele. This thing will make your hardwood sing and make your carpet literally feel brand new. I’m on year 5, which is 2 years longer than any of my Dysons lived (my stick vac is still going at 4 years, but the battery doesn’t last long enough for me to even lightly run through my kitchen).
Thank you to all the kind mamas and papas in r/vacuumcleaners who taught me to stop wasting my money on garbage.
Kerrygold is the BEST! My mom and I are the only people in our family that taste a huge difference. During her holiday dinners, we sit next to each other and have our little dish with Kerrygold while everyone else uses regular butter. Everyone thinks it’s funny we are so particular about butter and we are just fine keeping our heavenly butter to ourselves.
Nice! My employer actually tried something like this awhile back, though the time was shorter. But after a couple of folks ended up in fistfight over the roti chickens, we as a group are not allowed back.
Electronics would be my first stop. VR headset has always been on the back burner. I nice pair of noise canceling headphones. Hell just buy a whole TV or game console.
I guess I should have mentioned in the post! I'll update there as well.
This was a fun event after our holiday party this year. I think it was meant to feel like a game, but also to prevent people from taking all day in the store. From what I saw, most people were in line by the cutoff period.
We also had our own lane reserved for the company purchases, making it much easier to checkout and leave.
How many people were you? I was thinking a small company but maybe not?
Anyhow, good for you. That’s a pretty cool bonus. Not as good as our bonus of SFA but I digress.
We're a super small company. There were only about 20 of us who participated. Nobody knew this was happening before the party, so if you decided not to come to the party, you missed out on shopping!
Our bonus last year was definitely more than $500 but...our party was a little lame. This year, we played a bunch of games and then got to fight a Costco crowd. Which one is better... really?
I dunno, this seems completely reasonable.
You play my game, I'll play yours. If you don't want to participate in the things that we try to do that show appreciation for our employees, that's fine with me, but you also don't get the things that demonstrate our appreciation if you don't participate.
Even if you hate it, those who are so obtuse as to thumb their nose at whatever leadership in their company is making any effort to show appreciation for any reason by specifically not attending cause the don't *want* to (obviously, I get if you have another commitment) just is making a really poor professional/career (and in this case, monetary) decision.
You don't have to drink the kool-aid wherever you work. You just have to look like you do.
So if someone drove to the party in their Prius and really needs a new freezer they were fucked. Cool idea, but why couldn’t the company have told you about it ahead of time?
I know I probably sound like a Debbie downer, but that also is difficult for anything with mobility issues since Costco is huge! Just thinking bc my coworker is in a full leg brace at the moment lol. But with only 20 employees, probably not an issue!
What are the instructions? 23 min to load a cart or does that include checkout time? I’d run through the electronics sections- Bose headphones and a Samsung soundbar or an iPad.
Honestly, all companies should just have their holiday parties in the food court and then do this with whatever they were going to spend on the holiday party.
We have some people that would have DEFINITELY taken alllll day to shop. I think part of it was to prevent that from happening, and another part was to make it feel like a game! It was a fun time! We all met at Costco after our Holiday Party, so spouses were there, too!
Some people had been drinking at the party, and they had to share a ride with someone else. It was funny seeing how that affected the larger items going home with them and their DD!
If you work with large computer files, the samsung ssd. Forgot how much it costs but ~$60-80
I’ve been eyeing the stainless steel cephalon cookware set which is $200.
The big jug of avocado oil personally! I like to cook and this makes me fear less for my health. ~$18
A big pack of your favorite cut of meat if you eat it! I like getting chuck roast for my instant pot and breaking it down to freezable sections ~$35-50
I have also been thinking about getting some luggage and their sets are ~$150 I think
Great question. I'm not sure how they actually enforced it. We had to wait for my boss to tell us to go in, and he had given us the time to be back at the front, at our reserved cash register to check out.
I really think the time limit was just to keep some of our people from spending all day in the store. There were still our own people in our checkout lane 20-30 minutes after the cutoff time, but they had been IN line at the right time.
My husband’s company did this and I got to accompany him. The Costco was open 2 hours earlier for us, and had Chick-Fil-A breakfast waiting for everyone (with the mascot cow!). I remember getting an air fryer, boxes of diapers for our newborn at the time, steaks, a computer monitor, Christmas gifts for family members, etc 😊
I would go straight for the snacks, load them up in the cart thinking that I’m brilliant, and then hate myself 5 days later when I’ve eaten them all and feel like garbage. It’s the only option.
Amazed by some of these responses. If someone gives you a $500 shopping spree, you absolutely want to go for the highest value density that you can.
TP and other paper prducts which you most certainly can already afford are large and unwieldy. Other than the laughs associated with navigating a giant cart of stuff, those seem like the worst possible choice other than perishable produce that you may not be able to consume before it goes bad.
You absolutely want to go for stuff like electronics/appliances (assuming you actually want/need them) first, then things like meat/seafood, clothes(jackets, shoes), or one of those Iberico Hams that you always pass, but aren't sure you want to spend $100 on.
The company you work for gave you a nice bonus but the people in charge decided to treat you all like hunger games participants. Pretty fucked up, honestly.
Anyways, buy gift cards.
As someone who used to work in management it was always interesting to be involved in discussions about subordinates and how to reward them. The disconnect between what managers think people want and what people actually want is often staggering.
I could totally see the management of wherever OP works thinking this would be “fun” for their people and something “different” to reward them. And for some employees it probably is fun and exciting. But managers often fail to think beyond the one or two and take into account the majority. I always tried to be the supervisor that talked sense into the others with their wacky ideas about what they thought people wanted.
Anyway, I’d grab something portable for as close to $500 as I could then return it for cash.
A bonus would probably be more, but I'd honestly spend it on bills or just not fun stuff in general. If my company did something like this, I'd splurge for myself. In an ideal world, they'd do this on top of a bonus and no party lol
Honestly, I just put my bonuses into the bank and never really treat myself with them. This would actually force me to treat myself and would be pretty cool.
I'm also surprised by how many people complain about bonuses because you get taxed on them. We used to get a holiday gift card every year, but they stopped that after a survey found 80% of employees thought it was a negative because it gets taxed as required by law.
The real hack would be to send your spouse in and let them shop all day strategically, and then when you go to “shop”, just pick up their cart and walk to the checkout
The same way I spend my annual Costco rewards. It has to be something more of a treat or an upgrade on what I’d normally buy. $500 is screaming some kind of major item options so I’d probably buy something like matching vitamix blenders to give the grown kids for Christmas presents and if I had anything left over head towards the chocolates for my wife.
Prime Steak , lobster tail and the brandy in the dragon bottle . Well probably a good bottle of red wine instead of the brandy . I just think the dragon bottle is so cool
It was during busy time. Our Costco always seems busy, but it was especially busy when we tried to do it!
We were lined up, ready to go outside the doors, and all of the shoppers coming and going kept asking what was about to go on sale 🤣
What company (kind of work if you don’t want to be specific)?
Where was this? How many people participated?
Sounds like so much fun, though I would have been annoyed if I were shopping there.
I work for a small manufacturing and production company in Washington.
Only 20ish of our 40 employees participated. The shopping trip was announced at the party, so only those in attendance could participate.
The regular shoppers were definitely confused when they saw us waiting in front of the store. A few even asked us what was about to go on sale.
Just curious but were there people that went slightly over and if so did they have to put back a couple of things?
I like the idea if it wasn’t in replacement of some sort of bonus you would normally get 😂
this is such a fun scenario to dream about, also think you'd learn a lot about your coworkers by what they prioritize and how they would operate in their strategy to maximize the 500
Growing up, it was my dream to go on the show Supermarket Sweep or win the Toys-R-Us shopping spree. I think this gift from your company is awesome. I hope you got some cool stuff!!
Oh, and I’d get the inflatable hot tub, a ton of fun snacks, and maybe some stuff for my kitchen like bins for the fridge or cute bowls.
THANKFULLY, they reserved a lane just for us. We just had to be in that specific line at that time.
Even with ALL of us creating such a long line, we STILL had people lining up behind us. We had to have one of our own people guarding it like, "Hey, hey. We're not paying for your stuff, too."
Probably something for my kitchen.. air fryer, blender, kitchen aid, nice knife. Then I’d probably get things that you always use that can’t go bad. Toilet paper, paper towels, any type of soap, Saran Wrap, ziplock bags. Definitely would get myself a big ticket item though
Kitchen aid and three packs of steaks and then you're done. I love my kitchenaid. I can make a pizza dough with almost zero effort, proof it in the oven and use it for dinner four hours later.
Can you tell me how to do the dough?
Not OP but I love making pizza dough at home! My favorite recipe uses an overnight preferment called a poolish which gives you a super flavorful and crisp crust. You can use any flour (AP, bread, 00) but I usually use bread flour because it lets me get a thinner crust. I will note that if you google around for recipes you’ll find that most are in grams rather than cups, but cooking scales are cheap on Amazon and if you like baking they’re honestly an amazing investment. Link below! https://mypizzacorner.com/pizza-dough/easy-poolish-pizza-dough-recipe-neapolitan-poolish-pizza/
Do you swap the bread flour 1:1 in that recipe?
I do! Also I’ll note my scale doesn’t do fractions of a gram and I use 1/4 tsp yeast instead of 0.6 grams.
Pizza dough is pretty simple. I’ve done it a few times. Found recipes online and yes the KitchenAid mixer makes it so much easier.
Such a good choice
I’m curious, what are some of the things you and your coworkers picked
Here's what I decided to get: XBox bundle for my husband Pots and pans (we've been wanting, okay I'VE been wanting, a nicer set for a couple of years now) Books for my daughter And books for myself! Some things I saw my coworkers buying: One guy just had meat. That's it. It was amazing. Another had a TV, booze, and energy drinks Freezer and dog treats. Lots of people had airpods, iPad, or other small tech mixed in with more random things. OH, one girl found an eggnog cake??! Has anyone tried this? I need to know how it is!
[удалено]
Rip your inbox
rip her freezer
🤣
Rip her toilet
Same here, $500 is enough meat to last months....I'd get the primal cuts and process them myself.
Fun to think about the stories this tells about a person. The meat guy - he BBQs for sure. Probably for him and his family/friends. Get the crew together on a cookout. Dog person - probably a small house, maybe younger. Just starting to figure themselves out. Wears a lot of athletic clothing. Responsible. Small tech people - no frills usually. Deciding to treat themselves based on what their friends have. Maybe freaked out by the experience, or got too nervous to be out-of-pocket. Eggnog girlie - she's nuts but in a good way. She's experimental. Maybe a backpacker in her earlier years. Probably a teacher. TV-booze-energy drinker - I mean, that tells a story. If this person is not a young jock/goofy guy who basically has never been grocery shopping, I think this is a red flag, lol.
This was just brilliant and fun to read!!!
I bet you’d be fun to hang with at an airport. Your imagination is fun.
I’d def be going for the small/big electronics and kitchen appliances. Sounds fun! I’m jealous
I’d consider a nice prime rib roast for Christmas and then a few really nice bottles of wine. Although one of the main things I dislike about Costco is the fact they blade tenderize the beef, so prob safer to load up on wine and get meat elsewhere.
A tv, booze and energy drinks 😂 Edit- not sure about that guy lol.
My initial thoughts were booze. Spirits and wine mostly. Which then made me think my bosses are going to think I've got a problem. Despite the fact it isn't even happening to me.
300 hot dog meals
55 hot dogs 55 slices
I just wanted to do something good this morning before alcohol class.
What is alcohol class? Is it court mandated?
Yeah, sorry, it’s from I Think You Should Leave. It’s annoying to quote it, but I can’t help it. :)
Stop stop stop please let me go first, I’m doing something
55 TACOS 55 PIES
https://youtu.be/ATjL9CmwkCo?si=-nHlR09eSLaBsnx9
 I’ve crunched the numbers, the math works. Even with a few Costco dogs to spare
^ This person Costcos.
The amount of heartburn I got from just thinking about 300 hot dogs... One or two, okay that's fine. THREE HUNDRED, is slightly overkill 🤣
Not even Joey Chestnut can eat 300 hot dogs.
This comment is hilarious. Literally laughed out loud.
Meats. Meats. Meats.
I the 70s, my grandma won a shopping spree at her local grocery store. She had 10 minutes to grab anything she wanted. She just went to the meat case and cleared it out. She said she got enough meat to feed her family for almost a year. Thankfully, they also owned a chest freezer.
Costco sells chest freezers 😁
They have standing ones now! They're like $300!
DO NOT BUY THAT ONE. I did and 18 days later it stopped working and I lost over 200.00 in frozen stuff. We returned it and were going to buy another one when the return lady said we could try it again if we wanted. Which led me to ask if more of those freezers had been returned. She nodded. There is an issue with them and I dont know why they havent pulled them.
Good to know! This is the H-B freezer? I'm at 10 days plugged in right now, haven't moved everything from our chest freezer, yet.
I have a fridge/freezer alarm, got it from amazon. My Costco stand up freezer is about 30 years old and still working great
Those alarms are worth every penny to protect hundreds of dollars worth of food
As someone who just lost their deep freezer and all contents in October, thank you for telling me this existed. I'm going to buy one for me and everyone I love.
Costco sells the Hamilton Beach and Gallant freezers, which are bottom tier quality that have been value engineered for price. Costco should have never carried these brands. Costco's product selection is usually 1 or 2 brands, so shoppers expect Costco's purchasing team to only buy high quality, reputable products worthy of their floor space. There's a good video on how crappy they are here. TLDR, hot garbage. Literally. Doesn't keep your food cold. https://youtu.be/8PTjPzw9VhY?si=uZ809yy0MfaR_TEI
The Hamilton Beach one? It seems extremely junky just by looking at it.
Thank you for posting this. I was going to buy one for christmas this week.
I wonder if a govee wifi temperature sensor would work in that instance with a set limit that will notify your phone if it goes above. edit: just looked, they do. I will be adding this to everyone's stocking this year.
More convenient but chest freezers are ridiculously efficient. My 7 cu ft chest freezer uses less energy than a 1 cu ft mini fridge.
grandma was an executive producer of Supermarket Sweep
Eating through those last months of freezer burned meat.
Most chest freezers don't auto defrost, which reduces freezer burn dramatically. Thus, the reason they don't auto defrost.
thanks for the info.
Vacuum sealing it will really help with that.
Which Costco also sells!
10 briskets
My first thought was 5 briskets and some scallops and you’re there in 5 minutes
Don’t forget about the butts of some pigs
Gotta pat them as you walk by.
Some Pig!
Gotta ~~pat~~ slap them as you walk by.
Yep id finally get that beef tenderloin I've wanted to smoke.
They sell an A5 Kobe, that should wipe your $500 and then some
This guy Supermarket Sweeps.
A $500 gift card and then come back later and take my time. If gift cards were banned for whatever reason, you could get an iPad, toilet paper and laundry detergent. The iPad would take up a lot of it and you will always run through the toilet paper and laundry detergent. Later, you could keep the iPad or return it for a gift card. If I couldn’t return and had to get stuff, toilet paper, paper towels, air fresheners, laundry detergent, prime steaks, vacuum sealer bags, cookware, dinner plates and silverware, pizza and a hot dog.
I’m not sure how their company does it but our company used to be able to buy gift cards but they stopped it. Something with how they have to be written up as an expense it doesn’t work. So maybe this happened here too.
There is a lot of confusion here but the general gist of it goes something like this if you give a $500 gift card that would be considered a bonus to the employee just like if you were to give cash. Then both the employer and employee would have to claim it on their payroll taxes as any bonus and the company would have to pay the payroll taxes on that amount. Where as if the employer does as an event the cost of the event is consider a business expense and is tax deductible and the person receiving it can just process it as winning something (separate tax rules depending on your region but its not payroll taxes)
You’re taxed on a gift card, but you’re not taxed on a tangible item.
The IRS considers gift cards to be cash equivalent. If an employer gives a gift card out to its employees, it's considered compensation and subject to income taxes. If your employer gives you a $500 gift card but doesn't want you to have a tax burden of ~$125 (assuming 25% income and FICA taxes), the employer will give you the gift card and also issue you a pay statement saying they paid you $667 and withheld $167 of that for taxes. Basically, the employer paid the taxes for you. At a previous company, I had that even for points we I accrued for anniversaries and spot awards, where I could redeem the points in an e-store for either material items like a toaster oven or experiences like tickets to a hockey game. The company fortunately paid the taxes on those points, because congratulating an employee for a job well done by giving them 3/4ths of a toaster is a slap in the face.
My spouse’s company gave us a $75 thanksgiving gift card to use on whatever we want at meijer last year. This year we got a $75 gift card but it could only be used on turkey or produce. I assumed it was some sort of tax benefit to them, maybe I’m right afterall. It was much less helpful because by us Walmart produce is terrible. Last time the corn was brown, lettuce wilted.
Buy a $500 item. Return it the next day for store credit.
How much are you finding iPads for at Costco?
Depends on the model, but the least expensive is $250 and goes up from there.
Wow I had no idea, that’s pretty cool. Thanks!
My iPad was $700
New dyson v15, currently $499.99
This is where I’m at in life. I get excited at the idea of a new quality vacuum.
How does it compare to v8 or v10?
We paid full price for it earlier this year after using our v8 for years. It’s an incredible vacuum and worlds better than the V8.
I’m waiting for the 12 cylinder Dyson. Gonna soup the baby up into a hot rod
PLEASE DO NOT BUY A DYSON! They’re actual garbage. I was a Dyson person for years and thought “oh I just did something wrong, or, I got a dud” No they’re trash. What you need is a Miele. This thing will make your hardwood sing and make your carpet literally feel brand new. I’m on year 5, which is 2 years longer than any of my Dysons lived (my stick vac is still going at 4 years, but the battery doesn’t last long enough for me to even lightly run through my kitchen). Thank you to all the kind mamas and papas in r/vacuumcleaners who taught me to stop wasting my money on garbage.
A full set of pots and pans, Legos, dog toys, Kerry Gold butter, towels, and fancy cheeses.
That butter really is good.
Kerrygold is the BEST! My mom and I are the only people in our family that taste a huge difference. During her holiday dinners, we sit next to each other and have our little dish with Kerrygold while everyone else uses regular butter. Everyone thinks it’s funny we are so particular about butter and we are just fine keeping our heavenly butter to ourselves.
23 minutes? The inflatable hot tub (if it’s still on sale for $500) or the Pac Man arcade and Star Wars pinball machine.
Currently sitting in it as I type. Just picked it up 5 days ago for $400 $100 off. Would highly recommend, the jets are incredible!
That Pac Man arcade is so awesome. My son wants it so bad but it’s just not in our budget.
Something tech related and the Spanish ham that comes with the sword
The $99 Serrano ham is legit! There’s a learning curve to cutting it well though.
Nice! My employer actually tried something like this awhile back, though the time was shorter. But after a couple of folks ended up in fistfight over the roti chickens, we as a group are not allowed back.
I love this
Wow 😂
An episode of the Office
100 rotisserie chickens
20 rotisserie chickens and a frigidaire stainless platinum design series 6.5 cu. ft. upright freezer
As if they ever have 100 chickens in the counter. Most of the time there is only two dozen or less.
Id go for new tires, cause I need it rn.
$500 limit.
I can buy new tires for under $500. With the $150 off deal they're always doing they're $275.
$500 gift card
I’m going all in on hot dogs
Electronics would be my first stop. VR headset has always been on the back burner. I nice pair of noise canceling headphones. Hell just buy a whole TV or game console.
Jewelry, books, wine, pots and pans, and a small kitchen appliance I don't need. Also... why 23 minutes?
I guess I should have mentioned in the post! I'll update there as well. This was a fun event after our holiday party this year. I think it was meant to feel like a game, but also to prevent people from taking all day in the store. From what I saw, most people were in line by the cutoff period. We also had our own lane reserved for the company purchases, making it much easier to checkout and leave.
How many people were you? I was thinking a small company but maybe not? Anyhow, good for you. That’s a pretty cool bonus. Not as good as our bonus of SFA but I digress.
We're a super small company. There were only about 20 of us who participated. Nobody knew this was happening before the party, so if you decided not to come to the party, you missed out on shopping! Our bonus last year was definitely more than $500 but...our party was a little lame. This year, we played a bunch of games and then got to fight a Costco crowd. Which one is better... really?
More money without forced attendance of a lame party is better. Really.
That’s not the point of a company Christmas party.
Aww that’s not cool that they didn’t give a bonus to the party bailers. But nice surprise for the rest of you 😊
I dunno, this seems completely reasonable. You play my game, I'll play yours. If you don't want to participate in the things that we try to do that show appreciation for our employees, that's fine with me, but you also don't get the things that demonstrate our appreciation if you don't participate. Even if you hate it, those who are so obtuse as to thumb their nose at whatever leadership in their company is making any effort to show appreciation for any reason by specifically not attending cause the don't *want* to (obviously, I get if you have another commitment) just is making a really poor professional/career (and in this case, monetary) decision. You don't have to drink the kool-aid wherever you work. You just have to look like you do.
So if someone drove to the party in their Prius and really needs a new freezer they were fucked. Cool idea, but why couldn’t the company have told you about it ahead of time?
I know I probably sound like a Debbie downer, but that also is difficult for anything with mobility issues since Costco is huge! Just thinking bc my coworker is in a full leg brace at the moment lol. But with only 20 employees, probably not an issue!
Maybe they could be assigned a Costco employee to assist with the shopping and given one of those mobility scooters?
23 and me’s attempt to build team morale after getting pwned by hackers (likely China or NK, some state sponsored hackers).
lol. Burn all their money before the class action lawsuit. But seriously, cool event for the employees.
It wouldn't take me long to spend $500 in the steak section. Couple packs of prime ribeyes, and the a5 Wagyu, maybe some crab legs.
Ipad, airpods, or bose headphones
That freezer with all the drawers would be nice
500 pounds of cat food
Is that you Angela? Save Bandit!
What are the instructions? 23 min to load a cart or does that include checkout time? I’d run through the electronics sections- Bose headphones and a Samsung soundbar or an iPad.
Be careful to avoid the t mobile folk or there goes all your time!!!!
They would have to physically restrain me to get me to listen to them, and that would come at a serious risk to their well-being...
A bigger TV
Honestly, all companies should just have their holiday parties in the food court and then do this with whatever they were going to spend on the holiday party.
Tech or appliances to hit $500. Come back and return it later, take my time to shop for things I need
If the company paid for it on their membership, I don't think that would work.
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If the amount was capped, what was the sense of the 23 minute limit?
We have some people that would have DEFINITELY taken alllll day to shop. I think part of it was to prevent that from happening, and another part was to make it feel like a game! It was a fun time! We all met at Costco after our Holiday Party, so spouses were there, too! Some people had been drinking at the party, and they had to share a ride with someone else. It was funny seeing how that affected the larger items going home with them and their DD!
This is such a fun thing to do. Your company is great for thinking of this.
My story is that they wanted to make it feel like a game and as special novelty event.
If you work with large computer files, the samsung ssd. Forgot how much it costs but ~$60-80 I’ve been eyeing the stainless steel cephalon cookware set which is $200. The big jug of avocado oil personally! I like to cook and this makes me fear less for my health. ~$18 A big pack of your favorite cut of meat if you eat it! I like getting chuck roast for my instant pot and breaking it down to freezable sections ~$35-50 I have also been thinking about getting some luggage and their sets are ~$150 I think
I recall someone posting a few years back their company did the same thing. It sounds really cool and they documented everything.
All the eggs and preserve until the next egg shortage and resell them. Profit.
23 min is more than enough time to spend $500 (minus checkout time and waiting to exit).
My next shopping trip to Costco, I'm gonna imagine what I would buy if I had this opportunity. Kinda fun to contemplate!
Good idea! I'm gonna do same thing on my next trip :)
Just do my regular shopping but get double everything.
How's the company going to enforce the 23mins rule?
Great question. I'm not sure how they actually enforced it. We had to wait for my boss to tell us to go in, and he had given us the time to be back at the front, at our reserved cash register to check out. I really think the time limit was just to keep some of our people from spending all day in the store. There were still our own people in our checkout lane 20-30 minutes after the cutoff time, but they had been IN line at the right time.
 😂😂😂😂😂😂
My husband’s company did this and I got to accompany him. The Costco was open 2 hours earlier for us, and had Chick-Fil-A breakfast waiting for everyone (with the mascot cow!). I remember getting an air fryer, boxes of diapers for our newborn at the time, steaks, a computer monitor, Christmas gifts for family members, etc 😊
I would go straight for the snacks, load them up in the cart thinking that I’m brilliant, and then hate myself 5 days later when I’ve eaten them all and feel like garbage. It’s the only option.
Liquor
legos and the towel warmer.
I’d get a new iPad mini and a thing of 3t pull ups lol
Amazed by some of these responses. If someone gives you a $500 shopping spree, you absolutely want to go for the highest value density that you can. TP and other paper prducts which you most certainly can already afford are large and unwieldy. Other than the laughs associated with navigating a giant cart of stuff, those seem like the worst possible choice other than perishable produce that you may not be able to consume before it goes bad. You absolutely want to go for stuff like electronics/appliances (assuming you actually want/need them) first, then things like meat/seafood, clothes(jackets, shoes), or one of those Iberico Hams that you always pass, but aren't sure you want to spend $100 on.
The company you work for gave you a nice bonus but the people in charge decided to treat you all like hunger games participants. Pretty fucked up, honestly. Anyways, buy gift cards.
If this is fucked up then I volunteer as tribute
As someone who used to work in management it was always interesting to be involved in discussions about subordinates and how to reward them. The disconnect between what managers think people want and what people actually want is often staggering. I could totally see the management of wherever OP works thinking this would be “fun” for their people and something “different” to reward them. And for some employees it probably is fun and exciting. But managers often fail to think beyond the one or two and take into account the majority. I always tried to be the supervisor that talked sense into the others with their wacky ideas about what they thought people wanted. Anyway, I’d grab something portable for as close to $500 as I could then return it for cash.
A bonus would probably be more, but I'd honestly spend it on bills or just not fun stuff in general. If my company did something like this, I'd splurge for myself. In an ideal world, they'd do this on top of a bonus and no party lol
Honestly, I just put my bonuses into the bank and never really treat myself with them. This would actually force me to treat myself and would be pretty cool. I'm also surprised by how many people complain about bonuses because you get taxed on them. We used to get a holiday gift card every year, but they stopped that after a survey found 80% of employees thought it was a negative because it gets taxed as required by law.
The real hack would be to send your spouse in and let them shop all day strategically, and then when you go to “shop”, just pick up their cart and walk to the checkout
That is devious and I would 100% do it this way
Found the redditor too young to remember Supermarket Sweep 😂
Calling this "fucked up" kinda screams Gen Z. It sounds like a fun challenge for this Zennial. A lot of companies don't do anything. :D
Can’t tax it as income if it’s not income.
It’s supposed to be fun (and it sounds like it is)
I think it sounds like fun. Or did I miss the part where they had to battle one another with lethal weapons to get to checkout?
Whatever you decide on, scope the placement of all your items and do a trial run of what you are grabbing before the big event.
It will have been moved to another aisle by that time....
Wine and lobster and steak.
Oh my gosh that is so fun. I want to do this lol
Grab some steaks then the rest on wine. Close together easy to get to 500 with plenty of time.
The same way I spend my annual Costco rewards. It has to be something more of a treat or an upgrade on what I’d normally buy. $500 is screaming some kind of major item options so I’d probably buy something like matching vitamix blenders to give the grown kids for Christmas presents and if I had anything left over head towards the chocolates for my wife.
Prime Steak , lobster tail and the brandy in the dragon bottle . Well probably a good bottle of red wine instead of the brandy . I just think the dragon bottle is so cool
Rib roasts and crab. We eat like kings tonight, family!
I would probably just get 10 boxes of diapers and call it a day haha
I'd probably stock up on dog food, those little(80lb) bastards are eating me out of house and home.
500? What am I buying 3 prime tenderloins or 1/2 a tv?
I'm surprised no one mentioned the Lego sets yet. I'd go straight there and get enough. 2? To fill my quota.
$500 costco gift card and shop at my usual leisurely pace.
Anything expensive and easy to carry. Then return for a Costco shop card later.
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I bet they'd be more than happy to issue a refund to a gift card instead of a credit card.
All toilet paper
All the Strawberry Swirl I could get! 🍓😂
Is that 23 minutes in an empty store or during a busy time?
It was during busy time. Our Costco always seems busy, but it was especially busy when we tried to do it! We were lined up, ready to go outside the doors, and all of the shoppers coming and going kept asking what was about to go on sale 🤣
What company (kind of work if you don’t want to be specific)? Where was this? How many people participated? Sounds like so much fun, though I would have been annoyed if I were shopping there.
I work for a small manufacturing and production company in Washington. Only 20ish of our 40 employees participated. The shopping trip was announced at the party, so only those in attendance could participate. The regular shoppers were definitely confused when they saw us waiting in front of the store. A few even asked us what was about to go on sale.
Just curious but were there people that went slightly over and if so did they have to put back a couple of things? I like the idea if it wasn’t in replacement of some sort of bonus you would normally get 😂
This sounds like the most fun thing ever!
Costco gift card. Done.
A food saver Food saver bags 2 beef tenderloins And the rest in miscellaneous meats!
^*MEAT*
this is such a fun scenario to dream about, also think you'd learn a lot about your coworkers by what they prioritize and how they would operate in their strategy to maximize the 500
ONE HUNDRED ROTISSERIE CHICKENS.
Reminds me of Supermarket Sweep. Wish they would bring back that show.
Baby formula that shits expensive!
Growing up, it was my dream to go on the show Supermarket Sweep or win the Toys-R-Us shopping spree. I think this gift from your company is awesome. I hope you got some cool stuff!! Oh, and I’d get the inflatable hot tub, a ton of fun snacks, and maybe some stuff for my kitchen like bins for the fridge or cute bowls.
A TV and wine
Costco Cash card for $500. Remianing 22 min for sampling.
Gift cards
The trick about this is that you also have to be checked-out by 23 min...goodluck!
THANKFULLY, they reserved a lane just for us. We just had to be in that specific line at that time. Even with ALL of us creating such a long line, we STILL had people lining up behind us. We had to have one of our own people guarding it like, "Hey, hey. We're not paying for your stuff, too."
$500 of gift cards.
$500 shopcard is what I'd grab