Attention shoppers! What’s your take on Costco’s new warehouses in Sydney and Canberra? I hear it’s chaotic out there — so let me (and other Giz readers) know if the tech bargains are worth the fuss. Likewise for Apple’s new store in Penrith — did you test drive the new MacBook Airs? Email or tweet @giz_au your pics/video, and comment within.
Frosty
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 2:57 PMWent to the Canberra Costco and would say I didn’t see any inviting tech bargains but very happy with alot of the prices on the food, 1kg bag of salty chips mmmmmmmmmm :)
Muskrat
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 3:08 PMYou cant access their website to check anything out. Maybe its on purpose to make you pay for membership.
I wanted to check out pc’s prior to Aldis $599 deal next week.
Cheers M.
Muskrat
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 3:08 PMhttp://www.aldi.com.au/au/html/offers/offers_20110728.htm?WT.z_src=main
Chris
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 4:48 PMThis is what the first 1500 people were greeted to, me included :)
http://a7.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/267372_239644829390483_100000349028768_790342_6903236_n.jpg
Chris
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 4:49 PMAt the Penrith Apple store that is…
Mitch
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 5:55 PMWhat was in the box?
Gabriel
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 6:43 PMDid you get whatever was in that box for free? Or is that just part of the visitor guide?
Chris
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 11:33 AMThe box was given out to the first 1500 entrants with the visitors guide.
Visitor 1501 and then on, just got the guide.
DogGunn
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 5:55 PMOoo, what’s inside it?
nak
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 9:50 PMIt’s a T-shirt, probably large or extra-large. I’ve got about a dozen of them from various store openings in the states. The box is neat, it’s a sort of origami, the shirt itself is pretty lame though
Robert
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 2:01 AMYou’ve been to a dozen or so apple store openings? You need help. I’m deadly serious. There IS something wrong and you should talk to someone about it.
Mojolicious
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 3:51 AMOoooo… Mystery box! Pick the mystery box!!! It could be anything… even another mystery box!
Troy
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 11:22 AMHell it could even be a boat!
Chris
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 1:10 PMI was hoping that it would be a bobble-head of Steve Jobs :P
Jetty
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 6:52 PMWas at Sydney Costco, so many people, could not move around. Wagyu beef is cheap and tasty !!
Edes
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 7:59 PMI hit up Costco – it was awesome.
Great bargains available.
nak
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 9:47 PMHaving recently moved from the US to Melbourne I can tell you Costco is god sent. It was my favorite place to shop there, and it’s my favorite place to shop here. Memberships work worldwide by the way… so I continue to renew my US membership at US$50/year.
Vic
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 11:30 PMMmm buy an apple product in Penrith …..yeah …. if your car is still there you will mugged and dismembered before you get to it.
mark
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 10:02 AMGood stuff, keep spruiking that rubbish and we will continue to live the good life out here without pretentious douchebags such as yourself. Whilst driving everywhere without any traffic and living in our substantially sized house that don’t cost a million bucks.
H
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 11:24 AMYay for big houses and big cars! Perth rules.
Pete
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 12:40 PMyou’re not too bright are you Vic?!!
ed
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 12:24 AMcostco aint bad for food but techwise it aint to cheap and there is not much range. prices are usally par with jb or goodguys. at keast with jv and other places u can still bargin prices
pv
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 10:04 PMThe free Apple t shirt is one size fits all and it is knee length which doubles as a pyjamus. Many in Sydney store opening complain it does not fit anyone at all because it is so large, presumably for average Americans (XXXXL)
Borys Pawliw
Monday, July 25, 2011 at 8:41 AMCostco in NSW has a 16GB Sony NWZ-S755 16GB Walkman MP3 player for $120 – normally you’d pay $170-200. Worst case with Costco, a few prices are slightly higher than the cheapest retailers, most times they are on par or a bit better and about 25% of the time they are a comparative bargain. Depends on many factors.
DK Son
Monday, July 25, 2011 at 10:13 AMI heard a lot of the food was overpriced. Article in the paper said price comparisons made Woollies and Coles look like they were almost giving food away. Oranges at 79c/kg were $2.70/kg.
And it has turned Parramatta Rd into 10x worse than it was before. This was a pretty busy section already, being the area of the entrance points to Olympic Park and near the Auburn McDonald’s intersection that is right near the M5 entrances.
I went to Repco, a few blocks down from Costco and it took me almost 30 mins to get there when it usually takes me 10. So that sucked. I know it’s the Honeymoon period but srsly gtfo soon pls and return to normal traffic.
Haydn Allbutt
Wednesday, July 27, 2011 at 11:19 AMI went to Sydney Cosco on the weekend (Sunday 24th). The line to get in was massive. It went half way around the car park and had about 100-150 people in it. They had stopped letting people in because the store was full. One of the stressed looking employees giving out free chuppa chups said how it was crazy inside, people were fighting over items that they wanted. I never made it in so I will have to have a look at the place another time. I am surprised that they put the place on paramatta road. It has played havoc with what is already a very chaotic road in terms of traffic. They were initially considering a site up at Rouse hill which would have had plenty of space and far better roads. But I guess they wanted to be in the geographic centre of Sydney.
Tboy
Thursday, August 11, 2011 at 9:01 PMWent there to find that it wasn’t all that great. Some tech stuff is around the same price whilst others are slightly more. The chaos inside was not managed whatsoever and there were some near fights as tensions were high. Mostly due to the staff letting more and more people pile in without any plan for getting them back out anytime soon. After about an hour my wife and I just left our things in the trolley and walked out with nothing, it just wasn’t worth the few dollars of ‘savings’.
Btw the trolleys don’t make sense. They are too wide to fit side by side once the place is packed yet so shallow that they really don’t provide any additional storage space compared to a normal trolley. I think if they replace the trolley’s with normal ones there’d be a lot more room inside the store and people wouldn’t need two of them.