- Costco's fiscal Q4 2026 was a record: net sales of $93.87 billion, up 11.2% year over year, with net income of $2.998 billion ($6.75 per share).
- The company got a $0.15-per-share tariff-refund windfall — and it's using the savings to cut prices on coffee and everyday items instead of pocketing them.
- Even without the one-time refund benefit, net income and EPS still climbed more than 12%.
- Costco ranked the #1 retail brand in America in the ChangeUp 2026 Experience Report (6,500+ consumers), dethroning H-E-B.
- Growth continues: 939 warehouses worldwide, 33 more planned for fiscal 2027, and membership fee income hit $1.849 billion for the quarter.
Costco just turned in the kind of quarter most retailers only dream about. In the fourth quarter of fiscal 2026, the warehouse giant pulled in $93.87 billion in net sales — up 11.2% from a year ago — with net income of $2.998 billion, or $6.75 per diluted share. Even by Costco's famously steady standards, this was a blowout. And here's the part that should make your wallet happy: Costco plans to spend some of that windfall on you.
The $0.15 that lands straight in your cart
Buried in the earnings was an unusual line item: a one-time tariff-refund benefit worth $0.15 per share. Tariffs the company had paid were refunded, and rather than keeping the cash, Costco is doing something quietly radical with it — cutting prices.
The company says it's using the refund money to lower prices on coffee and other everyday items, fighting the inflation pressure its members still feel while keeping its own margins intact. It's a classic Costco move: when the business gets a break, members get the break.
Think about what that means at the checkout. The chain that already prides itself on razor-thin markups is voluntarily shaving prices further — precisely when shoppers are still smarting from years of food inflation. A cheaper bag of coffee beans might not sound like much, but multiply it across every staple in a Costco cart and it adds up fast.
And the quarter didn't need the one-off boost to impress. Strip out the tariff refund, and net income and earnings per share still climbed more than 12%. Comparable sales rose 9.4% (6.7% excluding gas inflation and currency swings), store traffic grew 3.3%, and the average ticket was up 5.9%. More people are coming in, and they're spending more when they do.
The membership engine that never stalls
Costco's real superpower isn't selling bulk toilet paper — it's the membership card. Fee income hit $1.849 billion in the quarter, up 7.3%, and $5.907 billion for the full fiscal year, up 11%. Executive membership penetration reached a record high, and digital sign-ups keep growing.
That loyalty just earned national bragging rights. In the ChangeUp 2026 Experience Report, released Sept. 29 and built on 6,500+ consumers and 400,000+ data points, Costco was ranked the #1 retail brand in America — dethroning H-E-B. (In-N-Out took the top spot among restaurants.)
Growing, pruning, and the Kansas City shuffle
The footprint keeps expanding. Costco opened 28 warehouses in fiscal 2026 — 25 net new — bringing the worldwide total to 939. Another 33 are planned for fiscal 2027, including 5 relocations, with a long-term goal of roughly 30 net new warehouses a year.
It's also pruning. On the Sept. 24 earnings call, CFO Gary Millerchip revealed that Costco Next — the online third-party marketplace launched in 2017 — was shut down on Aug. 31. The most popular items and brands are being folded "more seamlessly into the Costco app and website," he said, adding that the shutdown was "not material to our results."
One store is getting a dramatic second act: the Kansas City Midtown warehouse closes Thursday, Oct. 1, after 25 years serving the area, and will reopen in spring 2027 as a Costco Business Center — a B2B format that drops the tire center, optical department, food court and alcohol sales. The pharmacy stays open for at least a year, and the city council has approved the rezoning.
The one sour note
Wall Street, naturally, found something to nitpick. Eight research firms cut their price targets after the earnings beat, cautioning that the tariff refund is a one-time sugar rush. Daiwa cut its target to $950 with a neutral rating; RBC set $1,000 with a sector-perform rating. With the stock trading around 44.5 times earnings, the skeptics say perfection is already priced in.
Maybe. But for the millions of Americans rolling those giant carts through the aisles, the math that matters is simpler: a record quarter, prices about to fall on the coffee and staples in your cart, and a company still betting — 939 warehouses and counting — that you'll keep coming back.