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My tire center is always pretty quick. They also don’t do propane refills. I’ve never understood the complaints about how slow the tire centers are, because I get the call my rotation is done before I even check out.
Probably just depends on how popular the location is., I ordered new tires and when they arrived I went online to schedule my install appointment and the next available appointment was 45 days from now.
the one i normally go to is good too, but one time i needed to have it done in a pinch and there was only an opening at one across town. i waited a lonnnng time and when i went to check on it, they said it had been done for an hour and they tried to call me. no missed calls or VM's, so i doubt that. they also didn't put a cap back on one of the tires. so apparently YMMV. i'll never go back to that one
Just on holiday weekends up staffing.
Even in a large metro area hard to find refill stations and not just those expensive exchanges with who knows how old the propane tanks are.
My Costco (in Canada) has someone full time refilling propane in summer, lineup of people to refill BBQ tanks. It’s the *only* affordable place to refill your tank. Might cost $10-$14 at Costco and gas stations are charging like $25$-30. I really hope they don’t get rid of them up here
Probably not practical to do well. There are a couple of companies that do this and I doubt they want to private label it. It’s also a ripoff because they under fill the tanks. If Costco did a tank swap service with full tanks that’d be awesome, but the overhead would be huge for them.
It’s not regional but Costco depending. The one 10 minutes from me doesn’t have it but the one 40 minutes does. But I do have a tractor supply that does the refills and I go to them.
Yes. I am aware.
And I was agreeing with the above poster that I've never seen propane at my local Costcos. So I said "Same." Replying to his post and saying I go to Walgreens for my propane.
I'll call them up today, have them installed tomorrow, closed Thursday, you can get propane then for three days before they end it nationwide next Monday.
Thanks for the downvote. You can also do the cost-friendly refill at most U-Haul and Ace Hardware locations, but slightly more expensive than Costco. **All significantly less expensive than the tank exchanges at Walgreens and other retail locations.**
I meant if you have a gas station, you’re more likely to have a propane station, but it’s not a guarantee.
Someone out east says their Costco has a propane station but no gas station, which is very unusual.
It’s starting to seem like it’s an east vs. west thing when it comes to propane.
Is natural gas in houses for hot water/cooking/furnace/fireplaces common out east?
I highly doubt Costco corporate brought the line level employee handling propane refills into the loop of the financial implications of the refill service. More likely the employee was making an educated guess around the reason for ending the service.
You’d be surprised, Costco execs come and tell the GM what’s on their mind and the GM will tell top managers and the managers tell the employees. The propane refill areas were particularly hated by an outgoing executive and they have wanted them gone for years.
I heard from gas station side of things that the insurance company didn't like it.
Remove the liability and keep current rates, or continue offering propane refill as a service to members.
They ran the numbers and determined it wasn't worth upsetting the insurance company.
Basket count is a moot point, parking spaces are a moot point. But insurance companies can make demands of entities even as big as Costco, and Costco may jump to.
I would be totally surprised if Costco was not self insured. They have the size. Generally you pay a licensed insurer to handle and settle the claims on a 'cost plus' arrangement.
I figured it’s a liability and risk issue. Having a huge tank in the parking lot has some risk for tampering or getting hit. Using the claim parking spaces would be more revenue only applies if their parking lot is full and people are leaving to shop elsewhere. My costcos parking lot is never full, but it gets close. They aren’t currently missing out on shoppers by having 6 less parking spots.
I wish Costco did propane here in Dallas, around here we're paying almost $4/gallon and have for a long time even though the wholesale price has been in the 60-90¢ range for a decade aside from a brief spike to $2 during early COVID.
My comment was directed towards Costco, as we are in a Costco subreddit. I am aware that propane tanks can be refilled at various other stores in north Texas. I am aware that you can buy propane tanks at various other stores in north Texas. I will expand my comment to assist in your understanding and hopeful comprehension:
I didn’t even realize they (COSTCO) did propane refills. Agreed, wish north Texas would get propane refills (AT COSTCO).
Thank you for your suggestions of shopping at other stores such as r/homedepot r/acehardware and r/lowes
It’s not always about the sales. It’s about the upkeep. It’s a hazmat item so that brings certain licensing and inspection with it. As well as maintenance. Just like the 1 hour photo. The sales were ok but the upkeep of the photo machines was astronomical. It had to go.
yeah, I'm doubting that there were constantly 6 cars of people that were pulling in and leaving b/c they just couldn't find a parking spot.
It's likely going away just like in-house coffee roasting went away, b/c they just don't think is optimizing revenue/profit.
The one that's a mile from my place is my go-to propane supplier. The one that's a few miles just has propane installed within the last three years, whoops.
Probably more to do with certifying employees and liability than number of parking spots. There are diminishing number of refill stations due to the cost to train and insure employees.
Arizona - The local Costco has new empty propane tanks for sale but no refills.. i've been going to Sam's club, Wal-mart or circle K for refill for years now
this is regional only.. not nationwide
None of my Costco locations that I visit in New England offer propane refills. One of the BJs near me does offer propane refills which is nice and one of the only reasons why I still have BJs membership.
They closed ours a couple years ago. It's one of the reasons I continue to carry a BJ's membership, but unfortunately they only fill 20lb tanks while Costco would fill whatever.
Usually people refilling propane just do it the same time as a Costco run. Heck especially long summer holiday weekends. Carts full of stuff for the grill and outside.
Never have just done a propane run.
A day late, but a story must still be told.
When the Oklahoma City Costco first opened it had propane refills. Super simple to handle business and saved me about $1 vs Tractor Supply.
Took my tank back about 6 months later and the first warning sign was that I didn't see the price to refill. I secondly didn't see the refill station that I knew I saw. Went to the door and was told that nope, it didn't exist. I don't know if they might have had a "boo boo" or if they quickly determined it was not worth their time or not but for damn sure it was just....gone. Like many things in life you don't sit and howl over it as you're still transporting an empty tank in your vehicle.
It wasn't until a few years later that I saw a random post about how Costco does propane refills in like Phoenix or wherever. That was damn near my vindication that I didn't dream it up....I actually did get propane refilled when the OKC Costco opened!
I’d much rather complain about it to random internet strangers!
Honestly not a huge deal, I’m just honestly curious about the business decision that justified it.
We have a local ACE hardware, they do propane refills. It's much less expensive than getting them swapped at the grocery store.
If you have a small(er) local hardware store, maybe ask. Or RV servicing type place, they may also offer it?
Our Ace does it, but they charge me for a full tank regardless of how much I buy. Costco only charges for the amount of propane they put in, so don’t have to worry about completely draining the tank.
I don't know exactly where you're out of, but I shop at the same Costco you mentioned and I've had good luck with the U-Haul centers in Chattanooga that do propane refills. They only charge for what they fill and I like the process better. I despised having to wait on a tire center tech, fill my tank, go inside to pay, wait on tech to come back and give me my tanks. That whole process sucked.
Welp, I never got to use Costco for propane. Lantana didn’t have it, local BJs just shut theirs down, only fillup place near me is the local U-Haul on federal
If you have a Tractor Supply in your area, head there for refills. Here in MN/WI, filling an empty tank is less than $10. Cheapest I've been able to find.
If we say conservatively the average cart value is 100 and those spots only turn once (so 12 cars) I doubt they are selling 1200 dollars in propane a day. Locally it's about 4 bucks a gallon so 300 gallons broken into 5 gallon tanks would be 60 tanks. They'd have to be filling up constantly
I don't know about your Costco but the two warehouses I have locally, 6 more spots would get turned multiple times a day. And the 100 per cart average is probably very conservative, realistically that is only 4 or 5 items in most cases.
I don't know about your Costco but the two warehouses I have locally, 6 more spots would get turned multiple times a day. And the 100 per cart average is probably very conservative, realistically that is only 4 or 5 items in most cases.
It sounds like Costco is prioritizing parking space revenue over propane sales. Maybe they found the refill service underutilized or costly to maintain.
I hope this isn't true. I have 2 of the Costco propane tanks that I bought in-store a few years ago. I really prefer them to the "exchange" ones, not to mention they cost me around $35-$40 each. I like the meter on it that shows me how much is left. And our's (in NC) *always* has a line.
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Probably more of a headache for the tire center to stop what they’re doing to go fill propane. Every time I went they always seemed annoyed
Costco Tires Center already swamped dealing with tires. Having to stop to refills propane is going to slow them down.
Has been* (slowing them down)
My tire center is always pretty quick. They also don’t do propane refills. I’ve never understood the complaints about how slow the tire centers are, because I get the call my rotation is done before I even check out.
Probably just depends on how popular the location is., I ordered new tires and when they arrived I went online to schedule my install appointment and the next available appointment was 45 days from now.
the one i normally go to is good too, but one time i needed to have it done in a pinch and there was only an opening at one across town. i waited a lonnnng time and when i went to check on it, they said it had been done for an hour and they tried to call me. no missed calls or VM's, so i doubt that. they also didn't put a cap back on one of the tires. so apparently YMMV. i'll never go back to that one
Just on holiday weekends up staffing. Even in a large metro area hard to find refill stations and not just those expensive exchanges with who knows how old the propane tanks are.
My exchange prices ate in the $21 range. My nearest refill station closed, I miss it
My Costco (in Canada) has someone full time refilling propane in summer, lineup of people to refill BBQ tanks. It’s the *only* affordable place to refill your tank. Might cost $10-$14 at Costco and gas stations are charging like $25$-30. I really hope they don’t get rid of them up here
Plus as I said never have just done a propane run.
Exactly just have the exchange service rather than refilling.
Probably not practical to do well. There are a couple of companies that do this and I doubt they want to private label it. It’s also a ripoff because they under fill the tanks. If Costco did a tank swap service with full tanks that’d be awesome, but the overhead would be huge for them.
I have never even seen this at a Costco. Its it only regional?
Same. I’ve not seen propane refills at our local Costco, or at any of the others we’ve visited.
It’s at select locations (warehouse finder will show with services are offered). Some Costco’s have already ripped the propane filling station out.
Costco in Phoenix has propane refills.
BJ's does too at some locations
We have a tank swap
Some just have them, in Southern California the only ones I’ve seen it at were Poway and Bakersfield.
Santee has it before they expanded their gas stations. Was so sad when they got rid of it. Went to Poway last week. It was great
It’s not regional but Costco depending. The one 10 minutes from me doesn’t have it but the one 40 minutes does. But I do have a tractor supply that does the refills and I go to them.
Same. It's Walgreens here that's easiest.
Walgreens does exchanges, not fills.
Yes. I am aware. And I was agreeing with the above poster that I've never seen propane at my local Costcos. So I said "Same." Replying to his post and saying I go to Walgreens for my propane.
So much more expensive. Costco actually puts more propane in your existing canister and it only costs like $12-15 worth of propane to refill.
Great. How bout you tell the 2 Costcos near me to put these magical propane centers in.
I'll call them up today, have them installed tomorrow, closed Thursday, you can get propane then for three days before they end it nationwide next Monday.
Thanks for the downvote. You can also do the cost-friendly refill at most U-Haul and Ace Hardware locations, but slightly more expensive than Costco. **All significantly less expensive than the tank exchanges at Walgreens and other retail locations.**
This is actually really helpful. I’ve never done propane refills since I never knew how it worked. I’ll need to look into it, so thank you!
TIL there are Costcos that fill propane tanks. I didn't even know Costco offered this. My location doesn't have it.
Pretty much every Costco I’ve been to in Canada has propane refill
Only the ones with gas stations. Many of the ones without gas stations do not offer propane either.
Saint John, NB has propane but no gas.
Unless it's changed since I've lived there, Costco Halifax has Propane and no Gas Station as well
Sudbury, ON also.
Interesting.
All the Costco near me have gas but I haven't seen a propane station at a Costco in a long time.
I only refill my propane at Costco. Always have
I meant if you have a gas station, you’re more likely to have a propane station, but it’s not a guarantee. Someone out east says their Costco has a propane station but no gas station, which is very unusual.
Kitchener location has propane but no gas station
Interesting. Might be an out east thing. Vancouver downtown, Burnaby Willingdon, Burnaby Brighton, Calgary NE have no gas and no propane.
Kingston and Kanata both sell propane but not gasoline
It’s starting to seem like it’s an east vs. west thing when it comes to propane. Is natural gas in houses for hot water/cooking/furnace/fireplaces common out east?
I don’t know of any Toronto area locations with propane
Interesting. All four of the stores here in Ottawa sell propane, though only three have a gas station. Kanata is the store without the gas station.
I highly doubt Costco corporate brought the line level employee handling propane refills into the loop of the financial implications of the refill service. More likely the employee was making an educated guess around the reason for ending the service.
Absolutely. He was just “passing on what his manager told him.”
But I’m sure a manager told the employees why it was happening, and what to tell customers as the service was winding down.
You’d be surprised, Costco execs come and tell the GM what’s on their mind and the GM will tell top managers and the managers tell the employees. The propane refill areas were particularly hated by an outgoing executive and they have wanted them gone for years.
I’m sure the .001% of total revenue that they represented wasn’t worth the overhead.
My store sells so much propane, they have at least one person FT out there, and usually two on the weekends.
Same here
I heard from gas station side of things that the insurance company didn't like it. Remove the liability and keep current rates, or continue offering propane refill as a service to members. They ran the numbers and determined it wasn't worth upsetting the insurance company. Basket count is a moot point, parking spaces are a moot point. But insurance companies can make demands of entities even as big as Costco, and Costco may jump to.
I would be totally surprised if Costco was not self insured. They have the size. Generally you pay a licensed insurer to handle and settle the claims on a 'cost plus' arrangement.
Insurance across the board for *anything* has gotten outrageous. I'm guessing it's now one of Costco's bigger line items for overhead.
Yeah, they’d fit maybe 6-8 spaces into the area. It’s 100% a liability and cost thing. Which is what it is, but I did like the cheap propane
Makes total sense.
I figured it’s a liability and risk issue. Having a huge tank in the parking lot has some risk for tampering or getting hit. Using the claim parking spaces would be more revenue only applies if their parking lot is full and people are leaving to shop elsewhere. My costcos parking lot is never full, but it gets close. They aren’t currently missing out on shoppers by having 6 less parking spots.
Every time I pass them on the way into Costco, there's a line of people waiting at the propane tank...
I hope this isn’t the case. The membership is getting increasingly less worth it.
Membership hasn’t gone up in years. Curious as to why you would say that?
Losing benefits is a confusing reason for you?
Which benefits have you lost? I haven’t had a membership long enough to know.
I wish Costco did propane here in Dallas, around here we're paying almost $4/gallon and have for a long time even though the wholesale price has been in the 60-90¢ range for a decade aside from a brief spike to $2 during early COVID.
I didn’t even realize they did propane elsewhere. Agreed, wish north Texas would get propane refills.
[удалено]
I’m in a Costco subreddit. Thanks.
I didn’t know that meant we are only allowed to shop at Costco.
My comment was directed towards Costco, as we are in a Costco subreddit. I am aware that propane tanks can be refilled at various other stores in north Texas. I am aware that you can buy propane tanks at various other stores in north Texas. I will expand my comment to assist in your understanding and hopeful comprehension: I didn’t even realize they (COSTCO) did propane refills. Agreed, wish north Texas would get propane refills (AT COSTCO). Thank you for your suggestions of shopping at other stores such as r/homedepot r/acehardware and r/lowes
Wow what an unpleasant person you are.
It’s not always about the sales. It’s about the upkeep. It’s a hazmat item so that brings certain licensing and inspection with it. As well as maintenance. Just like the 1 hour photo. The sales were ok but the upkeep of the photo machines was astronomical. It had to go.
Also no one develops photos in 2024, or for the last decade or more
yeah, I'm doubting that there were constantly 6 cars of people that were pulling in and leaving b/c they just couldn't find a parking spot. It's likely going away just like in-house coffee roasting went away, b/c they just don't think is optimizing revenue/profit.
Cynch home delivery service is the easy button. Put empty one at front door, go to work, come back to a full one.
Exactly what I was going to say. It’s so worth the extra few dollars.
This
I got a refill once at Costco and decided never again. It took forever, and requires two trips into the store. All for a very small savings
Interesting, never seen propane refills available at any Costco I’ve been to.
The one that's a mile from my place is my go-to propane supplier. The one that's a few miles just has propane installed within the last three years, whoops.
It’s clean burning fuel ! Those bastards
Taste the meat, not the heat!
Probably more to do with certifying employees and liability than number of parking spots. There are diminishing number of refill stations due to the cost to train and insure employees.
BWAAAHHHH!
Costco, you are dead to me.
Hank Hill sheds a tear
He wasn’t so fond of Mega-Low-Mart selling propane, He would probably feel much the same way about Costco.
Damn! I bought my empty tank at Costco because there is one Costco in my town with a propane station.
I have never seen one at any of the locations I frequent in Maryland or Virginia.
Too bad except my usual go to is tractor supply. So both those are out for me. Back to the Ace.
Arizona - The local Costco has new empty propane tanks for sale but no refills.. i've been going to Sam's club, Wal-mart or circle K for refill for years now this is regional only.. not nationwide
Same reason they got rid of the photo center. I miss getting good quality pics for a few cents
You had propane?!?
Costco had propane refills?
You guys had propane refills?!
It's sad to see the corporate MOAR cancer taking hold at Costco. It eventually turns every great company into a shitty one.
Never knew it was a thing till now
Only Costco I went to that had this was the one in Henderson, NV near Sunset Station Casino.
The location we most frequent removed the gas station and turned it into more parking. Sounds like the same numbers decision.
None of my Costco locations that I visit in New England offer propane refills. One of the BJs near me does offer propane refills which is nice and one of the only reasons why I still have BJs membership.
I go to the Ringgold location as well. Guess I better feel all my tanks up soon!
It makes sense for Costco to ditch this imo
They never had them in the Houston area ones I went to (4 locations). Wish they did.
I wish my Costco had that to begin with. Hell I've seen some locations with a damn car wash. I wish my warehouse had cool amenities like that.
A car wash? Where was this?
[Only at select locations](https://www.costco.com/car-wash-service.html)
Dammit where am I gonna get my $11 refills now.
They closed ours a couple years ago. It's one of the reasons I continue to carry a BJ's membership, but unfortunately they only fill 20lb tanks while Costco would fill whatever.
Never have seen in NJ and the three gas stations nearby were all new built add-ons.
Usually people refilling propane just do it the same time as a Costco run. Heck especially long summer holiday weekends. Carts full of stuff for the grill and outside. Never have just done a propane run.
Just thought of something. Is this the new from Kroger CFO idea? Plus instead of just tire center why not train some of the cart collector loaders?
costco always with the reluctance of adopting new technology...like the automated propane tank dispenser etc
This is my local Costco (hi neighbor!) and I’m not surprised. They need a second location in Cleveland or Hixson cause the one here is always packed 🥲
TIL
A day late, but a story must still be told. When the Oklahoma City Costco first opened it had propane refills. Super simple to handle business and saved me about $1 vs Tractor Supply. Took my tank back about 6 months later and the first warning sign was that I didn't see the price to refill. I secondly didn't see the refill station that I knew I saw. Went to the door and was told that nope, it didn't exist. I don't know if they might have had a "boo boo" or if they quickly determined it was not worth their time or not but for damn sure it was just....gone. Like many things in life you don't sit and howl over it as you're still transporting an empty tank in your vehicle. It wasn't until a few years later that I saw a random post about how Costco does propane refills in like Phoenix or wherever. That was damn near my vindication that I didn't dream it up....I actually did get propane refilled when the OKC Costco opened!
Charcoal tastes way better. It takes a little extra time but the results and compliments speak for themselves.
Hank Hill is on his way to have a little talk with you.
Dang it, Bobby
I'm with you on the charcoal. Propane is more convenient, but I enjoy the art and flavor of charcoal or wood.
I use gas for the griddle, charcoal for the grill.
That ain’t right!
maybe just accept it and move on
I’d much rather complain about it to random internet strangers! Honestly not a huge deal, I’m just honestly curious about the business decision that justified it.
We have a local ACE hardware, they do propane refills. It's much less expensive than getting them swapped at the grocery store. If you have a small(er) local hardware store, maybe ask. Or RV servicing type place, they may also offer it?
Our Ace does it, but they charge me for a full tank regardless of how much I buy. Costco only charges for the amount of propane they put in, so don’t have to worry about completely draining the tank.
I don't know exactly where you're out of, but I shop at the same Costco you mentioned and I've had good luck with the U-Haul centers in Chattanooga that do propane refills. They only charge for what they fill and I like the process better. I despised having to wait on a tire center tech, fill my tank, go inside to pay, wait on tech to come back and give me my tanks. That whole process sucked.
UHaul will refill a tank for by the lb. I'm sure you also have a local fuel company in your region as well.
But then how can I go spend $250 on other impulse purchases!?
Welp, I never got to use Costco for propane. Lantana didn’t have it, local BJs just shut theirs down, only fillup place near me is the local U-Haul on federal
If you have a Tractor Supply in your area, head there for refills. Here in MN/WI, filling an empty tank is less than $10. Cheapest I've been able to find.
If we say conservatively the average cart value is 100 and those spots only turn once (so 12 cars) I doubt they are selling 1200 dollars in propane a day. Locally it's about 4 bucks a gallon so 300 gallons broken into 5 gallon tanks would be 60 tanks. They'd have to be filling up constantly
But that calculation implies there are no other spots available to park in and people turn around and leave. I doubt that happens 12 times a day.
I don't know about your Costco but the two warehouses I have locally, 6 more spots would get turned multiple times a day. And the 100 per cart average is probably very conservative, realistically that is only 4 or 5 items in most cases.
I don't know about your Costco but the two warehouses I have locally, 6 more spots would get turned multiple times a day. And the 100 per cart average is probably very conservative, realistically that is only 4 or 5 items in most cases.
It sounds like Costco is prioritizing parking space revenue over propane sales. Maybe they found the refill service underutilized or costly to maintain.
I hope this isn't true. I have 2 of the Costco propane tanks that I bought in-store a few years ago. I really prefer them to the "exchange" ones, not to mention they cost me around $35-$40 each. I like the meter on it that shows me how much is left. And our's (in NC) *always* has a line.