What is the hiring process like at Costco Wholesale?

-Most of my seasonal co-workers were a delight to work with. -Most of the customers were great.

-Awful management -Terrible hours -Relentless micromanagement -No benefits as a seasonal (they do make this clear up front) -Majority of permanent employees were rude and inconsiderate, with most of the supervisors being bullies -Obvious favoritism -Major gaslighting -Lots of little cliques between management & permanent employees -Seasonals generally treated with disrespect, from verbal abuse to dishonesty -Back-stabbing unprofessionalism -Clueless supervisors too inexperienced to know what they're doing -Bizarre cult-like atmosphere I was hired as a seasonal employee at the Ridgefield, Washington location of Costco in October of 2025, and this was largely a negative experience in every respect. From the very first day I was set loose to work in the front end of the store, it quickly became apparent that the permanent employees were exceptionally rude and inconsiderate to the seasonals to the point where I felt it was an expected part of their top-down management system. I wasn't the only seasonal who felt this way as the seasonals would regularly chat about the abuse they'd take on a consistent daily basis. The majority of the cashiers in particular were so exceptionally rude that the seasonals would dread having to work with them. The cashiers and supervisors would even bark and demean me and the other seasonals in front of customers. One night after being barked at by one of the supervisors, I helped a woman load her groceries into her car, and she said, "do they all talk to you that way??" It was abundantly clear that this newer store had even newer supervisors in charge, and they had absolutely NO clue what they were doing. The biggest morale-buster was watching the supervisors and permanent employees walk around together in little cliques, ignoring the seasonals, not even bothering to make eye contact with us. It truly felt like an us (seasonals) vs. them (permanents) scenario. Another disturbing thing about this location was the severe gaslighting and double-speak with the management. They'd constantly tell you to "cross-train" and "learn to do as many things as you can", but when you'd ask to cross-train and learn other things, they'd tell you to go push carts for the fifth day in a row. Then a few hours later, they'd remind you to cross-train and learn other things...it was a ridiculous mind manipulation. As a seasonal, you have a chance to get hired permanently later the next year, but most of the seasonals felt like this message was just lip-service -- why would we trust this company that wouldn't follow their words with actions? The management would all recite the exact same ideologies about "cross-training" and "working for one of the best companies in the world", but then consign you to do the most menial of tasks with no promise of any future with them. It got to a point where I could see they were putting me in their desired mindset so they could work me to the bone before laying me off and never calling me again, all the while talking down to me and treating me as if I were blind and stupid. As all this was going on, seasonals were quitting, getting hurt, etc. Each day was a brutal reset that I dreaded walking into. It also needs to be said that the micromanagement is ridiculous at this location. You can't even breathe without "checking in" with management. If any manager out there wants a quick lesson in how to lessen morale quicker than anything else, it's by micromanaging. The hours were atrocious, as well. Work/life balance? Good luck on that one. The management created this lame competitive atmosphere too, like we were all part of a retail Battle Royale or something. On orientation day, the manager of the food court popped into the room to tell us that we'd all be "competing" for a permanent position, and to "work hard or else!". Really? Do you seriously think it's a good idea to have a bunch of seasonals in the mindset of competing with each other for jobs that don't exist? It was a lame and unprofessional way to attempt to motivate a bunch of newbies who worked 10 times as hard as any of the permanent employees anyway. There was also clear favoritism running rampant at this location, mainly in the form of giving women the easier tasks and cross-training while the men were asked to push carts and box groceries day after day while being reminded to cross-train. DEI is a real thing at Costco, and while I suspect it changes with each location, the Ridgefield, Washington store is obviously very focused on hiring women over men, irregardless of work ethics. I agree with DEI approaches generally, but Costco skews those avenues in order to hit numbers rather than hire the right person for the job. Costco is very big on hierarchy for the sake of top-down management. The very basis of a hierarchy is inequality, and Costco employees seemed intent on constantly reminding the seasonals that this was so. The Peter Principle is very strong at Costco. Costco advances employees based on how much abuse they take, not for hard work, and then those promoted employees pass the abuse on down to the newbies. Trickle-down management styles is the expected norm at Costco, and if you dare to question it you'll be quickly pulled aside and warned. They cross-train certain people based on hitting agendas, not those who actually work hard and show results. The majority of the permanent employees were so epically bad at communicating that it was laughable. It was truly stunning watching some of these supervisors and cashiers communicate in truly toxic ways, and even more disturbing witnessing the tolerance of it by upper management. I didn't even make it through the season because I'd had enough of the nonsense. Perhaps this location is an exception, and as a longtime Costco customer, I hope that it is. But after working at the Ridgefield, Washington store, I look forward to never going near this location again. Costco management has this attitude of "well, working here isn't for everyone" as they employ all of these methods of manipulation and double speak. My response: who IS this for? People who enjoy being lied to? People who want to be married to a retail corporation because they get health insurance in exchange? People who don't mind being abused for the sake of hierarchy? This is why most work places make society a worse place to live, and disappointingly, Costco is one of those places.

Health benefits, 401k, co workers get along well

I have an extensive work history and this by far was the worst job I have ever had in my life. The overall energy in the store is draining and management overworks its staff to a ridiculous degree. Management is extremely disorganized and blame each other for everything while fixing nothing. Store is consistently understaffed. Managers are very rude and nasty. The sexual harassment that exists in the store is very bad and you're normally hushed with promotion. There is no air conditioning in the summer and no heat in the winter. Freezers melting in the summer along with the perishables stored inside. They say they are about DEI, but hire within a certain mile radius of the location so the selection process is not based off race, however if in a black neighborhood most of the employees are black and the stores in the black neighborhoods are neglected. Manager compared culture of employees to people who attract roaches.

All the pros are gone. Unless you work in the warehouse.

The worst place I have worked for. This is not the only Fortune 20 company I have worked for, and I have worked for companies in a developing country. They asked me to do things I was not hired for, and they were constantly reprimanding me for not performing the one thing I did not sign up for. As an established engineer, I can tell that most employees here have the skill of a fresh-graduate (with some exceptions, of course). And why wouldn't they? They were promoted, or hired from completely irrelevant jobs. One thing I will never forget was when my manager told me that they expect us to work, at the very least, 40 hours in a week and expected you to work more. This is part of the thing that irked me — they wanted me to work on weekends and ALL NIGHT, all while having the day job. You are not allowed to sleep. Sorry, but I'm a professional, and will not degrade myself for you, management, whose only job is to watch people, literally and physically. For context, I was actually performing really well, to the point that a VP, someone who was an outsider, someone who did not drink the Costco kool-aid (he was hired for this exact reason), actually recognized my work, out of the hundreds (if not thousands) of technical people there, and was asked for architectural opinions and presentations for other teams. It was not my performance, but the terrible management who plucked me out of contributing to the WHOLE COMPANY, only to be put in after-hours customer support... which is NOT a responsibility of our team in the first place. They don't care about your output, as much as they care about seeing you. Diversity does exist on the surface level, but there is discrimination based on ethnic background. Can I prove this? No. Does it happen? Yes. Just look at their management. They also do not account for inflation. And they expect you to go through a very convoluted and time consuming process of getting a promotion, all for a measly 3% MAX increase. Year after year, even with the BEST possible promotion rate (which you will never get), you are still technically getting a salary decrease. AVOID if you are a professional in the technical field.

Average minimum pay is higher than standard retail, starting at around $17.50 (Since Nov 2024), with a $1 raise every ~800+ hours you worked. The pay-scale is capped at between $25-32 CAD per hour. Culture and community is great. Employees starting at part time are eligible for benefits (dental, medical, retirement). Positions are also flexible to students as well through a program that retains that employee's current job position during a study period.

Moving up to higher positions can be difficult if you don't have several years of experience or have internal connections with upper management. For open supervisor positions, management tends to prefer hiring existing supervisors from other departments over employees that have worked for 5-10+ years in the Bakery department. In addition, certain supervisors tend to favor specific employees in the department through preferential treatment, facilitating a stressful and toxic work environment and creating an undesirable working space for both existing and newer employees

Costco's benefits are amazing and some of the managers are good, however our new GM is very friendly but I think she should be looking at the big picture rather than just one pixel.

Many of the managers come out of the office and say "Front End, we need to get another line open" and rather than helping either just stand their and watch or just go back to office. The new GM is very frinedly however, she and the store take about 2 months to hire anyone new, unless they transferred from another store, so we always seem to be understaffed on the weekends. Costco needs to just get rid of Self checkout because the members can only check out if there is an employee by the register. If you are working cart crew, which I do often, they do not reguarlly rotate you with other assistants, rather they just send the same people out again and they are usually the male employees

In relation to buying: - Job security - Very good pay as a buyer and as an inventory control specialist (ICS). - The work can be fun depending on what department you are in - Compared to other companies, you are given full rein to influence internal stakeholders and create meaningful change/innovate in the industry globally as the decision makers. - Company diversity - Not corrupt, company has good ethics - Open door policy, generally quite easy to speak to anyone across management about your concerns - Majority of the people are great, including some of management. - Benefits like free memberships, glasses, hearing aids, life insurance etc - Technical systems are simple enough to understand (albeit clunky).

Where to start. There are too many cons. - VERY poor work life balance. Unpaid OT is "expected" of the Assistant Buyers and Buyers and you will be shunned if you do not do it. People are doing on average 50-60+ hour work weeks and you are expected to dedicate your soul to the company no questions asked. - Lack of flexibility. Only 1 day WFH available for ICS and ABs (subject to management's approval). Buyers don't even get WFH. Unnecessary xmas black out period for all of Buying. No flexibility on start times and everyone is expected to be in at 8am/earlier otherwise you get a warning. You are not allowed to take AL before/after you travel for work (even though other departments in the company are allowed) - Workload is ridiculous with unrealistic/unclear deadlines and expectations. Not only are you expected to buy, you are also expected to do category management, demand planning, marketing, PR, compliance, operations, inventory, logistics, accounts, financial planning, member care, sales, ecommerce, and more; little resources to support even though the company's sales and profits are increasing every year. - very few things in place to improve employee wellbeing/morale. No Xmas parties, rarely any personal development courses offered, "fun days" to help employees take a break etc. - office also looks like a prison which doesn't help when you are forced to go in 24/7. - toxicity + biases remains the biggest problem. management has favourites and will choose people to target when they feel like it. If management doesn't like you, they will make your life hell to get you to quit. HR director is a known bully (no surprise as to why the HR department is always hiring), certain upper management in Fresh department is also a notorious bully and new country manager has a poor management style which is causing the employees to suffer. Many long time employees (10+ years) have quit/continue to quit because of how toxic the culture has become with the lack of personal accountability. - unable to negotiate pay if salaried.

Some co-workers and people are exremely nice. Benifits are nice

Upper managment has overwhelmingly shown they do not care about the well being of the employees. Terrible hours. Constantly work late into the night. Not LGBT friendly at all Manger at the company refused to respect another empoyees pronouns Zero showcase that they care about diversity and inclusion Multiple empoyees have said slurrs with zero repercussions No real way to move up in the company Severe lack of people for the workloads Lack of ability to help people on the spectrum with the job Manger of the department is alwasy on his phone and is alwasy hiding in the office and never helps out to do actual work Only seen the GM of the building actually go out and help people with work once in my 2 years here Zero employee discount Company likes to put all it's eggs in one basket and the teams are so small that when one person calls out sick the whole entire department is behind and cannot properly do the tasks asked of them Ask a manager for some help and they will not show up Asked an AGM for help and they said they would come back at 5 and never did Consistent feeling of being overwhelmed with no one to talk to or help with the task. Overwhelmingly shown that taking your legally apointed 15 minute breaks will put you behind in work and many employees have to skip them in order to get tasks done on time. When I brought this up to someone who was going to be a supervisor they just said "Yea just skip your breaks" Have had shifts where I work until 11 at night and then am expected to be at a meeting at 5 am the next day and then later that day at 1:30 when my co workers are expeicted to drive forklifts on only 5 hours of sleep Zero ability to get more hours past busy season and they will cut your hours without telling you after the season is over. Zero seasonal hires were brought on after the season was over. What is the point of hiring someone for 3 months if you are just going to fire them.

Higher pay per hour, better customers, better work flow

Toxic culture due to internal hiring and promotions only. Employees have learned to cheat the system. To look busy but don’t do the work. Seniority is heavy and treats new employees like dirt.

I was surrounded by highly skilled coworkers who always went above and beyond.

I think the onboarding process needs an improvement, it is a little unorganized.

Acceptable health and retirement benefits.

Extreme nepotism in hiring and promotion. Management does not support employees when problems or conflicts occur.