With the recent opening of BJ’s Wholesale Club in Hixson, Chattanooga Times Free Press business reporters split up and visited BJ’s, Costco and Sam’s Club to determine which local warehouse club offers the lowest prices and the best benefits to members.
Sam’s Club on Lee Highway is full of towering aisles of goods — so tall that they mesmerized David Floyd, the reporter dispatched to the store.
“For some reason, I had never been to a wholesale club before, despite growing up in a large family of six kids that would have almost certainly benefited from being able to buy toilet paper, Pop-Tarts and cereal in bulk,” Floyd said.
Also having grown up in families with six children, reporter Daniel Dassow and I were familiar with bulk-buying at warehouse clubs. I fondly recall my memories of Sam’s, where I was fascinated by the large packaging and delighted by the samples available around every corner.
But as an adult buying for a household of two, I often struggle to finish a half-gallon of milk before the expiration date and couldn’t justify spending money on a membership to a warehouse club. My first time in a BJ’s was opening day of the Hixson store at the Northgate Mall.