Depends on the location. Costco in brick has a very small percentage of minority shoppers. Others have more, but still have an outsized proportion of non minority shoppers. The membership fee is a huge barrier to entry. Costco also tends to sell higher quality items rather than aiming for rock bottom prices like Walmart or the dollar stores. That leads to a more affluent demographic of shoppers; the typical Costco shopper earns over 125k a year.
The older, whiter demographic also helps their shrinkage rate. Their loss rate due to theft and the like is at around .12% ; Walmart and Target have close to ten times that rate. It’s not the only factor. Costco is obsessed with shrinkage. Everything from having to show membership to enter, to store layout, to the packaging of even small items in large packages, is to prevent theft. Even the bottleneck by the exit waiting for the receipt checkers is intentional. And the receipt itself has codes for date, items that belong under the basket, and supervisors signatures for stamps and certain other items that make it really hard to sneak stuff past the door checkers.
They have a very different model than Target or Walmart, and this is reflected in their shopper makeup.
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Hence the calmer and safe feeling when shopping at Costco. (Taking advantage of CV's absence here
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