OPINION
It’s been just over a year since the behemoth store Costco Wholesale opened in New Zealand.
That’s a year of Kiwis being able to shop as they do in America: into those clattering big red trolleys we’ve piled food in giant jars and thick-plastic packets and in portion sizes not seen in New Zealand supermarkets before.
And while no one’s complaining about the discounts or the cheaper-than-chips rotisserie chickens, how is the advent of bulk shopping that Costco affords us affecting our health?
The Herald paid a visit to the big beige box in Auckland’s northwest with New Zealand dietitian MaryRose Spence to get her take on the pros and cons of shopping Costco-style.
“Gosh, look at that,” says Spence, picking up a 1.8kg box of 80 Sunkist fruit snack pouches. She inspects a pack of Crispy Coconut Rolls, which she says people tend to think is healthy because it’s coconut, but is actually 20 per cent fat.
Scanning the section of packaged snacks where you’ll find a 1.2kg tub of chewy rainbow sugar strips, called Fantasy Belts, and probably the biggest packs of M&Ms in the country, Spence, who assists people with weight management, often related to type 2 diabetes, raised cholesterol or blood pressure issues, says, “I hope people don’t bring children in here. It would sort of be like Christmas.”
Picking up a big bag of Tostitos corn chips, of which there are 22 portions inside, the dietitian of more than 35 years says, “The person who buys this is probably not going to serve 22 portions out of that are they?”
Tinned products are bigger too, she notes, finding 555g cans where most supermarkets stock 440g.
Of a 2.1kg tin of Nesquik chocolate milk powder, she says, “In terms of nutritional value, there’s nothing in there. Just the calories. Then kids get used to the taste of it and they want it.”
A range of Kirkland – Costco’s home brand – pizzas have an impressive amount of protein piled on top, she says, but at 1.1kg are twice the size of frozen pizzas found in other supermarkets.
She’s also impressed by the range of protein and seafood but as she picks up a hefty wad of wagyu beef rib eye steak and considers how it could be cut into more-reasonable portions, she says, “This is just overfeeding.”
What all of this equates to, says Spence, is eating more.
“The difference between being overweight and not can be three to five mouthfuls of food a day,” she says as she baulks at a 1kg tub of the Danish butter, Lurpak.
Of a two-pack of tortellini, she says buying a double pack of something “promotes over-eating too”.
While there are a lot of New Zealand products available at Costco, the American brands have different nutrition labelling, which can be difficult for Kiwis to understand, says Spence.
“They are really hard to read,” she says.
“Our labelling is quite different. You’ll see any American food is done as a percentage of the daily value, so you can’t really tell how much sugar is in it.”
In the produce section she finds butternut pumpkins the size of small backpacks, perfectly ripe vine tomatoes and extra-large bags of spinach priced similarly to smaller bags in supermarkets. However, she notes most of the vegetables are packed in plastic.
Picking up the sweet scent of the store-baked goods Costco has become famous for — giant cookie and croissant packs and trays of muffins the size of a person’s head — Spence says: “Oh my God, I hope this doesn’t upsize our country.”
She says a downside to buying products that are made in store is that the requirements for nutritional information are different.
“Because they make them here, they don’t have to put any nutritional analysis on it.”
And while she’s horrified by the gargantuan muffins, she’s impressed by the look and price of the sushi platters and Costco’s range of pre-made meals.
“They’re family-sized, which I quite like because it’s hard to get that. You know for Mum, Dad and a couple of kids.”
Eyeing up the chicken enchiladas, Spence notes for a busy family they’d be a better dinner option than takeaways.
“You’d need some veges with it, of course. Some frozen greens or a bag of salad. That would actually be quite cost-effective, but reasonable in terms of a nutritional choice.”
She also finds wild salmon fillets in the freezer section that, compared with the farmed salmon more commonly found in supermarkets, are far lower in fat: 20 per cent compared with 4.7 per cent in this case.
Heading towards the checkouts, Spence discovers Costco also has an exceptionally large range of beef jerky, which, some may be surprised to learn, is a reasonable choice as far as snack products go.
“It’s not a bad snack, actually,” she says, comparing it with its neighbour on the shelf: giant containers of nuts, which are far higher in fat than most people realise.
“There aren’t many proteins you can get that are not perishable and protein gives you longer-lasting appetite control.”
As we exit through the food court selling $2 hotdogs and make our way past the cluster of tables with sun umbrellas that look like a dystopian ode to a healthier life, Spence gives her verdict on the Costco experience.
“I think it’s just going to upsize people.
“It’s a false economy. You don’t need to buy in that sort of size packaging. I just think that unfortunately, Costco has this label around it where it’s cheap. But I think that it’s just like everything else in our food environment. We’re living in an obesogenic food environment and this is just another contributing factor,” she says, noting New Zealand’s obesity rates are at an all-time high.
Spence says while people are attracted to shopping there because it has this “connotation of being cheap, if you go there and buy more than you need, there’s nothing cheap about it”.
“You could go there and spend a lot of money and come home with a lot of poor nutrition in your basket. It’s expensive on their health, if they do overeat and gain weight,” she says, adding that a lot of the high-sugar items “were just way oversized. Back in the 1960s when we didn’t have these weight issues, they were luxury items”.
She points to a recent comment by Professor of Population Nutrition and Global Health at the University of Auckland, Boyd Swinburne, who noted what hard work it is to “not be overweight in this food environment”.
“As soon as you’re overweight, you’re going to have issues with cholesterol, blood sugar, blood pressure,” says Spence, who shares that she advised a client to stop shopping at Costco. “He loved going there because he thought he was getting a bargain. But he’s a big guy and he’ll never get his portions right, shopping at Costco.
“People have to turn it round and say, ‘is it good enough for me?’ rather than, ‘it’s a good price. Is this food good enough for my family?’”
Costco’s operating model of a subscription fee and a set number of members means Kiwi shoppers can get better deals for their money than they would elsewhere — but are we paying the price in terms of our health?
Michael Lee, an associate professor in marketing at the University of Auckland, points out shopping at Costco “works out cheaper per unit or per gram of the product you’re interested in consuming in the first place”.
“It doesn’t quite work out if you just end up using a lot more of something you would not have originally used a lot of ... you end up deceiving yourself into thinking it’s a better deal because you think you’re going to end up using that much of the product at the end of the day and therefore you pay a bigger up-front dollar cost.”
Lee says it’s hard to say whether Costco is a good or bad thing for New Zealand’s grocery market, because “they do promote excessive consumption. However, New Zealand is also lacking competition in food retail ... and any competition is still probably better than none”.
He points out that among the oversized products on offer, there are also several healthier options on its shelves and it would be “unfair” to target Costco alone when it comes to obesity caused by excessive consumption.
“The research is showing that it takes more than just the individualisation of responsibility to combat the obesity epidemic which the world is facing,” Lee explains.
“The number 1 predictor of people becoming obese is an environment that promotes obesity.”
The Herald contacted Costco for comment but did not receive a response.
'We are increasing prices by as little as we can.'