Costco Expands Footprint in 2025 as Other Retailers Scale Back

Costco is opening new warehouses in several markets, despite store closures and bankruptcies among other major retailers.

Customers wait in line to check out at a Costco store in Novato, Calif., on Dec. 11, 2024. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Costco has announced a series of new warehouse openings in 2025, even as some longtime retail competitors are closing stores or filing for bankruptcy.

According to the company’s website, Costco will add new locations in March and April across the United States, as well as internationally.

The retailer’s announcement follows its first quarter results for fiscal year 2025, in which it reported a 7.5 percent increase in net sales, underscoring a steady run of growth compared to industry peers such as JoAnn Fabrics, Big Lots, Party City, and Bed Bath & Beyond, which all filed for bankruptcy.

Details posted on Costco’s website indicate that newly scheduled openings will take place in Brentwood, California; Genesee County, Michigan; Highland, California; Prosper, Texas; Sharon, Massachusetts; and Weatherford, Texas, all in March. Locations in Stuart, Florida, and Minami Alps, Japan, are slated for April 2025, along with Ardeer, Australia.

This expansion stands in contrast to store closures by certain retailers. JoAnn Fabrics, for example, recently filed for bankruptcy protection and announced the closure of all stores, following the path taken by Party City and Bed Bath & Beyond, while Big Lots has continued reducing its brick-and-mortar presence.

Despite the broader challenges in retail, Costco’s 2024 fiscal year net sales reached $249.6 billion, a 5 percent increase from the previous year, according to its fiscal year 2024 financial report. The company also reported net sales of $60.99 billion in the first quarter of fiscal 2025, marking a 7.5 percent rise over the year-ago period.

Costco’s workforce has also seen some recent developments. Last month, the company and the Teamsters union announced a tentative agreement to avert a possible nationwide strike.

In a statement, the union said: “Additional details will be shared soon. The tentative agreement will be presented to the membership for a vote. Stay tuned.”

Earlier, Costco disclosed an internal memo outlining wage increases through 2027. Costco CEO Ron Vachris wrote in the memo, “With these changes, we believe our hourly wages and benefits will continue to far outpace others in the retail industry.”

Those raises bring many clerks to more than $30 per hour and offer additional vacation benefits for longer-tenured employees.

According to Costco, the company now operates close to 900 warehouses worldwide, with 617 locations in the United States and Puerto Rico. Its continued expansion underscores what has been a consistent pattern of growth, evident in both its revenue results and its push into new markets.

The company’s immediate plans center on bringing the new warehouses online, continuing an expansion that defies current trends of closures or downsizing by other household-name retailers. The move is widely seen by industry observers as a sign of Costco’s confidence in its bulk-sales model and a reflection of the positive sales data the company has recorded in recent quarters.