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Re:Costco gained a cult following by breaking every rule of ... by maxerickson on Sunday October 13, 2019 @05:31PM (#21243195)
You'll have to explain more slowly.

Are you saying that the way they account for memberships doesn't make much accounting sense?

(they break it out, page 37 http://investor.costco.com/static-files/05c62fe6-6c09-4e16-8... )

Re:Costco gained a cult following by breaking every rule of ... by projektfu on Sunday October 13, 2019 @05:39PM (#21243264)
No, Costco is accounting for it normally by putting membership fees up there with gross revenue. I'm saying the gee-whiz description of memberships being 75% or more of profit is silly. The firm has gross margins on its sales. It also collects membership fees. Any one of its product lines could be a large portion of revenue that you could single out as being the driver of their profit. I just think it's silly to single it out like that. Gross margin pays for the stores to be open just as much as anything else, and with less margin the stores could be out of business despite collecting all those membership fees.