Outgoing Costco CFO Richard Galanti on Tuesday provided an update on whether customers might see changes to the cost of the warehouse retailer’s $1.50 hot dog and soda combo.
The deal "is probably safe for a while" after his decades-long tenure as Costco’s CFO ends on Friday, Galanti told Bloomberg. Former Kroger CFO Gary Millerchip will succeed Galanti.
The hot dog and soda combo has long been a fixture of Costco’s food court, and so has its $1.50 price. The company hasn’t increased the combo's cost in the roughly four decades it has offered it thanks to a pledge from its founders, FOX Business previously reported.
Customers wait in line to order at a Costco food court outside a Costco Wholesale Corp. store on June 14, 2022, in Hawthorne, California. (PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images)
The retiring CFO previously faced questions about maintaining the combo’s price tag. In September 2022, when inflation was much higher than its current level, Galanti said the margin on its gas and travel businesses "help us be more aggressive in other areas or… hold the price on the hot dog and the soda a little longer, forever."
Meanwhile, Costco has made some recent changes to food options at its food courts.
The retailer stopped offering its churro. In place of the sweet treat, Costco added a chocolate chip cookie, Galanti said on Costco’s second-quarter earnings call. The cookie costs $2.49.
A look at prices at a Costco store's food court in Danville, California, on July 3, 2022. (Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images / Getty Images)
Costco’s food courts also recently began offering a $6.99 turkey sandwich, according to Galanti.
The retailer has said its ancillary businesses like food courts and gas stations encourage Costco members to visit its warehouses more often.
A view of a Costco store on June 28, 2023, in Teterboro, New Jersey. (Kena Betancur/VIEWpress / Getty Images)
Its total number of cardholders increased to 132 million as of the end of the second quarter. Costco has 875 warehouses worldwide.