Costco To Ease Buying Limits At Stores
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
PALO ALTO, Calif. — Costco Wholesale Corp. is reportedly moving to ease buying limits some of the chain’s managers imposed recently on staples like rice, cooking oil, and flour.
“We’ve tried to modify those,” the firm’s chief executive officer, James Sinegal, told Reuters yesterday. “So, if somebody is buying a reasonable quantity, we let them have it.”
The New York Sun reported Monday that at some Costco stores in Northern California rice was in short supply and most purchasers were being limited to one 20-pound bag. Limits were also in place on oil and flour at stores in New York and New England, the Sun reported.
Mr. Sinegal told Reuters that if a customer wanted “10 pallets of flour, we’d probably say, ‘No, we can’t give you that. We can give you one pallet.'”
The executive said buying of staples had increased in the wake of reports of food shortages in other countries. “At the moment, we think we have it relatively under control,” he said. “We don’t want to create a panic situation.”
The CEO of the California rice commission, Tim Johnson, told Reuters consumers should not be alarmed. “Bottom line, there is no rice shortage in the United States. We have supplies,” he said.
