# Costco 100% Raw unfiltered honey for $2.98 lb



## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Bulk honey prices for darker honey such as this are in the $1.50-1.70 range so I suppose it pencils out....barely. https://www.ams.usda.gov/mnreports/fvmhoney.pdf


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## DPBsbees (Apr 14, 2011)

jim lyon said:


> Bulk honey prices for darker honey such as this are in the $1.50-1.70 range so I suppose it pencils out....barely. https://www.ams.usda.gov/mnreports/fvmhoney.pdf


Jim, Can commercial guys make a living at these prices? Dan


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

DPBsbees said:


> Jim, Can commercial guys make a living at these prices? Dan


A simple question with a complicated answer. Everyone has their own unique costs and while production on a given year is obviously a big variable in the equation, there are lots of ways to derive income from bees other than just honey production. Pollination services (particularly almonds) now account for as much income as does honey production and yes its possible to do both unless you are pollinating late blooming summer crops. Also sales of nucs, queens and bulk bees can generate income without hurting honey production too much particularly if you are migratory. With all that said, I typically figure my per hive expenses in the $100 per hive range +/- which includes paying myself a fair wage. Do the math.


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

If in doubt do as a person I know did, have it analyzed. he was competing for the local market, turns out he had the only local honey, every one else was buying it in. My guess is some lawyer already had it analyzed and no law suit this year.


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## DPBsbees (Apr 14, 2011)

Thanks, Jim for a thorough answer. As the president of a county club I want to make sure that the members have a feel for what it is like to make a living in this business. People see those prices and are thinking " Why do this if that's all it's worth?". At my level it clearly wouldn't work if I needed to make a living at it. Dan


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

DPBsbees said:


> Thanks, Jim for a thorough answer. As the president of a county club I want to make sure that the members have a feel for what it is like to make a living in this business. People see those prices and are thinking " Why do this if that's all it's worth?". At my level it clearly wouldn't work if I needed to make a living at it. Dan


I know it's frustrating to see prices like this but don't feel like you need to directly compete with them. If you do a good job of marketing your honey and charge what you feel is appropriate I'm betting you will be surprised at how many folks are willing to pay a lot more to get good honey from a local beekeeper. There is nothing quite like the uniqueness of knowing the honey was raised from the flowers that grow in their locality.


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## e-spice (Sep 21, 2013)

My feelings on this is that people that sell honey (if this is real) this cheaply do a disservice to themselves and everyone else that produces honey. I don't see a way anyone could make any money selling for $3 per pound. It makes it tougher on all of us that ask a fair price for honey.


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## Mike Gillmore (Feb 25, 2006)

I wonder what it tastes like. Might be a partial answer to the question.


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

Mike Gillmore said:


> I wonder what it tastes like. Might be a partial answer to the question.


here is an unbiased review of the honey, I watched most of it, not much information

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24ygkjpyfzo

only other information available


> It appears that Costco has replaced its Kirkland Signature organic honey with the Kirkland Signature Organic Raw Honey. Raw honey supposedly means that the honey has not been pasteurized or filtered. Unfortunately, it's not stated on the packaging whether that is true or not.Apr 5, 2017


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## rwlaw (May 4, 2009)

You can bet that Costco secured a multi ton contract with a broker for last years honey and they’re going to take advantage of it. It’s a hook to get people to buy a brand and keep on doing it. I saw a gallon of milk at a big box outfit for 1.75 a gallon (not on sale), the next time I was thru there it was going for market prices.


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## elmer_fud (Apr 21, 2018)

I saw Colorado raw unfiltered honey at my local Costco this week. I should have looked at it closer, but I am sort of wondering if it came from LR rice since they are a big honey producer located in the area. I also already have enough honey that I didn't have any reason to buy more local honey.


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## kaizen (Mar 20, 2015)

I see it as i'm loading up sugar for my bees. i swear they put it right there to mock me


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## hagane (Aug 15, 2015)

I've been studying business and financial markets for a long time. If there's one thing I know is that people cheat a lot for money. 

Deutsche Bank for example. Its downfall right now is a result of its scandalous practice of trying to have its foreign investment branch give bad loans to dictator despot developing countries. (And its saying its fall is from derivatives). They were partly doing this because they could milk the US foreign aid on the sly from the dictator's side. And then they weren't prepared when the US started realizing we were just getting cheated by the foreign aid not really meaning people liked us or would follow through with their reasons for receiving it. During the mortgage meltdown they found out the CEOs for bank bailouts were being paid MORE than for what the bailout was worth....

Where I'm going with this is I wouldn't be a bit surprised if this is a scheme for masking imported product as domestic product. We already know that people do stuff like this. Sometimes they can claim its legal by saying 'the engine was assembled in country' even if the parts themselves were not. But its still a scheme.

Having the honey analyzed is a great idea. I bet you could have some veterinary lab somewhere do it. 

And as for where it's coming from... its very possible that a lot of that honey could be coming from places like Slovakia, Check Republic, Ukraine, Romania, and Poland. All of those are countries with people that have strong beekeeping traditions and histories. A lot of people are interested in bees from those areas now still also. And their financial markets are down a few grades from us, so it would be possible to explain where the thin gain is coming from. (There's even beekeeping channels on Youtube now for Vietnamese beekeepers...which totally surprised me. One of them did a video recently where he's got a hive with 5 live queens in the same hive.)

And do you think mathwise that honey could really come from in the US just with this year the whole US agriculture scheme being a total mess? There's just a 'much reduced' probability that the fields producing nectar flow aren't affected enough to be strong for such a low price. But I could be wrong? 

To be fair, my opinion is mostly as a math and business person and not as a real beek. But you do see schemes like this all the time. Like Costco has been under fire for changing a lot of stuff recently in ways that isn't entirely agreed upon by their customers. Like for no reason at all they changed their hot dog stand recipe, which had no problems and was popular with kosher beef and now isn't so kosher. And they also know that a lot other retailers are going down in flames right now. 

The list of store closures this year in the US is three times higher than it was last year. 

Hope that helps in figuring it out...there are a lot of places this could come from.


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## herb (Jun 7, 2018)

Not sure but after extracting my honey, cleaning up. thinking up labels, buying some, then ink for the **** printer I cannot see how honey production can ever be profitable. 

Kirkland signature clover honey is at the same price. 3.00 a lb. 

:ws:


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## jimbo3 (Jun 7, 2015)

17.29 for delivery to my area for 5 pounds, so about 3.50 a pound. Sounds like a great deal until I read "Product of Argentina and US". What's that mean? How much Argentina:US ratio? Can it be 99% foreign honey with just a little US honey mixed in to qualify? 

I have yet to sell any honey as last year was my first harvest and didn't sell any, so I am far from knowing anything. I'm planning on selling my honey this year at $10 a pound, so 15 bucks for a pint mason jar. I think that's reasonable, and I guess I'll soon find out.


edit: sorry, I didn't quote. this is re: the kirkland honey


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## edzkoda (Aug 9, 2014)

herb said:


> Not sure but after extracting my honey, cleaning up. thinking up labels, buying some, then ink for the **** printer I cannot see how honey production can ever be profitable.
> 
> Kirkland signature clover honey is at the same price. 3.00 a lb.
> 
> :ws:


Can't say anything. We don't have anything from Argentina to mix with our honey


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## mathesonequip (Jul 9, 2012)

a lot of products are trans-shipped. product of argentina blend sounds better than product of china thru vietnam. product of usa sounds even better. some one is fraudulent or is shutting their eyes to make a few cents. it is cheap to print the word raw. pure sounds better than rice syrup blend, or cheaper than corn syrup blend, if corn syrup is $1 cheaper a ton this week. the food and drug administration is a total joke. it would appear that costco is selling whatever this is at a profit with no one to stop them. i would almost bet that some "beekeeper" is relabeling this stuff and selling it as "organic" in a farmers market.


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## e-spice (Sep 21, 2013)

mathesonequip said:


> i would almost bet that some "beekeeper" is relabeling this stuff and selling it as "organic" in a farmers market.


Probably so. I'm always telling people there are no honey police.

It's tough enough to get a semi-reasonable price for honey produced honestly. CostCo and others are making it even harder.


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## hagane (Aug 15, 2015)

Re: the part of US honey mixed with Argentinian honey; 

Once again, very likely a product of slick lawyer mongering in import and trade laws. 

Its based of the concept of making the engine parts in China, or Taiwan, and then doing final assembly in Japan. (But people always try to carry the ball a bit further all the time.) 

In this case,...its probably very low percentage of the 'parts' made here, because greed is something you can always count on in this country unfortunately. Business people, lawyers, and others will always try a scheme like this if you let them. They may try to make people think that half or more of the honey is made here, but given how people lie, cheat, and steal, its very likely that only the box and labels are made here. 

(And another problem with this type of scheme is that they don't intend to leave it there. They will go for broke after people accept the idea of foreign honey and eventually leave out the domestic in country suppliers and only go foreign. That's how it always goes and that's how things started out with China. And you can see in the news all the time now, how that's going for us.)

If I were you guys, I'd have a vested organized effort to make sure honey production in the US stays domestic. The minute you let the foreign market in, it will be just like what's happened to manufacturing in this country. (No offense but this is factual.) I found out at Home Depot that we still make PVC pipes and lumber in the U.S., but that's about the only thing still made in the US except for military industry vehicles, jets, and small arms. (Other than that there isn't much going on in manufacturing anymore. And what does exist here and when they say some of the jobs are coming back, they plan to have those manned by robots and not people.) 

You can't compete with foreign industry without some kind of fence into play if you want to be able to support yourselves as beekeepers. I'd get organized and try to keep beekeeping in country. This hobby depends on the honey market to support the costs of the hives, and supplies it needs. 

Argentina also took huge hits to its financial markets over the last 5 to 10 years. So their wage and dollar conversion rate is extremely attractive to people with lots of money that like to exploit that sort of thing. And unfortunately these countries love bees and agriculture as much as we do, and they are pretty educated. (I see beekeeping videos on Youtube all the time in Spanish and Vietnamese, and even Romanian.) 

(I'm not being negative here, just proactive.)


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## hagane (Aug 15, 2015)

herb said:


> Not sure but after extracting my honey, cleaning up. thinking up labels, buying some, then ink for the **** printer I cannot see how honey production can ever be profitable.
> 
> Kirkland signature clover honey is at the same price. 3.00 a lb.
> 
> :ws:


I've noticed mason jars of various types aren't cheap now either. Even the Walmart special stuff if you were using that is around a dollar a jar with some fluctuation.


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## beesRus (Nov 15, 2018)

I went to Costco online and found below product descriptions. They state where each product comes from. I'm going to try to upload articles from their magazine, but if you don't see them later, it's because I couldn't figure it out. In the meantime, they seem to support ideas of how we shop - 1st buy local even if pay more; then buy regional, then PA, then made in USA, then global with Fair Trade and Sustainability practices.

1.	GloryBee - The Pacific Northwest region is known for its abundance of delicious blackberries. When honey is harvested from hives surrounding these blackberry patches, it possesses a deep golden hue and the flavors and aroma of an Oregon summer. The rich, warm flavor of Raw Pacific Northwest Blackberry Honey compliments baked goods, pancakes, oatmeal, yogurt, and fresh fruit. All of GloryBee’s raw honey is guaranteed to be 100% pure and unfiltered. It is heated to only 115° F and is strained, never filtered retaining the natural pollens and enzymes of honey straight from the hive. The texture can vary from liquid to creamy from batch to batch and season to season. This variation in texture is one indicator of the honey being 100% pure and raw. Product of United States of America. 18 oz. (6 pack)

2.	GloryBee Organic Raw Clover Blossom Honey Pail - Features: Organic Raw Clover; Non GMO; Country of Origin: Brazil, Canada & Mexico. Organic Raw Clover Blossom honey from GloryBee comes from remote areas worldwide where tracts of land are able to meet organic certification standards. This honey is produced from organically farmed clover fields and made in hives kept without the use of antibiotics, pesticides, fungicides, and herbicides.

This 100% pure, raw honey is not only organic and non-GMO, it is also sustainable and supports SAVE the BEE®. Read article about SAVE the BEE. (11.67 pail)

3.	Kirkland Signature - 100% Pure U.S. Grade A; Kosher; true source certified. Read articles about suppliers. (5 pound bottle)

4.	Kirkland Signature Organic Raw Honey, 24 oz. - Raw Organic Honey. 100% Grade A; Product of Brazil; USDA Organic; Honey bear plastic jar (3-pack).

5.	Comvita UMF 20+ Raw Manuka Honey, 8.8 oz. ($99.99); Independently certified UMF 20+ Raw Manuka Honey with MGO of 829+ 
•	Ultra premium and rare (represents <1% of the Manuka crop)
•	Highest UMF level for targeted uses
•	Sourced and packed in New Zealand 
•	Deliciously creamed 
•	Packaged in BPA-free jar 
•	WAYS TO USE: Enjoy a delicious spoonful in the morning or before a workout as a natural energy source. Add to your tea, toast, yogurt, or smoothie as a superfood. Use as a DIY face mask as part of your daily beauty routine. 
•	DID YOU KNOW? Comvita supplies medical-grade (sterilized, high UMF) Manuka Honey, which is administered topically for its antibacterial properties to treat wounds and burns in hospitals and wound care clinics. 
•	COMVITA HERITAGE From humble beginnings in 1974, and now with over four decades of perfecting the beekeeping craft, Comvita is the trusted global leader in Manuka Honey. They have over 40,000 hives and maintaining sustainable relationships with their beekeepers.

I’ll try to attach articles from Costco Connection Magazine, which members like our family receive.
https://www.costco.com/confidential-ethics-hotline-for-suppliers.html


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## beesRus (Nov 15, 2018)

View attachment Costco - 2019 bee local.pdf
View attachment Costco - 2017 cover - saving bees.pdf
View attachment Costco - Honey bee health.pdf
View attachment Costco - Bees are in Crisis.pdf


I really don't like being scammed, esp by large corporations, so I had to search this one. Before we became beekeepers, my son ate a lot of Kirkland honey!


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## username00101 (Apr 17, 2019)

Surprised this honey isn't coming from China.
=


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## beechet (Jan 4, 2018)

I bought about 3 jars last year and it was as good as mine. It was from Ga same as me. It wasn't Costco honey though.


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## JSallay (Dec 20, 2016)

I do not want to imply that Costco honey is not what they say it is, but international transshipment of (mostly Chinese) honey and other products such as rice syrup that claim to be honey is a major problem. Vietnamese "honey" market price is in the 80-90 cent range, so let your imagination run wild.

As part of my Master Beekeeper certification at Cornell University a few months ago, I did a presentation on this problem. A video is of an evening's series of presentations is available on the Cornell University Dyce Lab Facebook page (with my presentation starting at about the 1:01:00 point) at:

https://www.facebook.com/DyceLab/videos/vb.593672297496371/426500434832181/?type=2&theater 

Note that nuclear magnetic resonance technology is required to distinguish real honey from rice syrup, and is mostly done by labs in Germany. Even the Honey Integrity Task Force (a U.S. honey industry sponsored organization) has recently used C3/C4 testing to "certify" a lack of adulteration in U.S. honey, but this methodology cannot distinguish the rice syrup from true honey. So, even if a large packer or retailer honestly believes that they are selling real U.S. honey, they may themselves be getting scammed by their suppliers.

There will be session on this problem at Apimondia in Montreal in September.

John


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## Bmrosh (Jun 2, 2017)

If it looks like a turd and smells like a turd, you don’t have to taste it. 

So we all smell something fishy about $2.98 per pound honey. Take out the costs we all know about trying to sell our real US honey - containers, labels, transportation to and from market/customer, the $$ you spend to be present at a farmers market every week, etc etc etc. Take all that out and then add the inevitable middleman costs that must be involved in Costco carrying this product, and you get beekeepers working for maybe $2-3 an hour. Where in the world would anyone work for that wage?

The only way this can make any sense is if it’s rice syrup. Artificially colored and flavored. And we’re not even scratching the surface on the organic claim. How would this get passed off as raw organic made in the US? Politicians, overly capitalistic businessmen from the country that dominates the honey trade, and good old American blindness.

Whoever wants to buy this crud, let them at it. We’ll never get through to the masses. But we’ll keep trying, because we are American Beekeepers!


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## edzkoda (Aug 9, 2014)

Bmrosh said:


> If it looks like a turd and smells like a turd, you don’t have to taste it.
> 
> So we all smell something fishy about $2.98 per pound honey. Take out the costs we all know about trying to sell our real US honey - containers, labels, transportation to and from market/customer, the $$ you spend to be present at a farmers market every week, etc etc etc. Take all that out and then add the inevitable middleman costs that must be involved in Costco carrying this product, and you get beekeepers working for maybe $2-3 an hour. Where in the world would anyone work for that wage?
> 
> ...


Well said. Thank you


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## jimbo3 (Jun 7, 2015)

Bmrosh said:


> you get beekeepers working for maybe $2-3 an hour. Where in the world would anyone work for that wage?
> 
> How would this get passed off as raw organic made in the US?


It says product of Argentina and USA, so I'm assuming mostly from Argentina.


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## mathesonequip (Jul 9, 2012)

this sounds not related but it is. i bought a pair of work shoes at walmart. the style used to be made in china. they are identical and marked and labeled "made in vietnam". the box is labeled "printed in china". so much for the trade war that is 100% in the news. i am sure that costco and walmart are both 100% innocent, the innocent part was a bad joke, sort of.


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## hagane (Aug 15, 2015)

Today I went to the store and checked this out. I was interested to see what I'd find.

Yes, I did find that raw unfiltered for about 2.99...only it was walmart instead of costco. But it was the same bottle and label that had the argentinian honey. There was a slight difference though...maybe I'd just missed it before but I noticed the label of the 2.99 honey said, made in Canada, US, and Argentina. (I hadn't noticed the Canada label before.)

But what was kind of wild was after that type the honey price changed wildly at walmart. 

There was one type that was over 5 and a half dollars. It was the normal stuff. And then there was one maker that was over 7 dollars, maybe close to 7 and a half, the one that they leave a section of comb in with a jar of like 15 or 16 ounces of honey. Then there was the other kind saying raw and natural over 9 dollars for 1 lb.

My point with this is that if more beeks sell their own honey, I think it could demand to keep some of the price deflation from happening? (I realize also you wouldn't be able to do all of those or concentrate on it too much. But people do roadside stands for vegetables all the time where I'm at, and people like it.) Part of the reason why be packages prices went up was because all the beeks did so together. If more of the honey supply is at a higher price at a more organized rate wouldn't that mean potential for the price to go up? (Well the 9 dollar price is already a lot. I'm talking about the 3 and 5 dollar prices not being that great.)


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## Jim_in_PA (May 17, 2016)

One thing that doesn't seem to have been said is how Costco's business model works...they don't aim to make much or even any profit on the actual product in most cases. Nearly all of their profit comes from Membership fees and money earned from services. So it's very likely that they are selling this honey for close to what they paid for it wholesale. They are also not prone to subterfuge like some corporations, so I doubt that it is something other than they describe it. Yes, this pricing isn't helpful for local beeks, of course, but in many respects, it may be a different market, too.


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## NectarNed (Sep 28, 2018)

The commercial value of honey produced in the United States for honey is about $150 million dollars (at $1.03 per pound). The value of pollination services in the United States is $16 BILLION. (beespotter.org/topics/economics/)

Honey is a side show for large beekeeping companies. Honey production, contrasted to pollination services, is more labor intensive, and as with all labor intensive products, overseas competitors with access to cheaper labor have an advantage. American companies probably make enough from honey to pay for fuel and new tires for their trucks. A primary goal of business is to reduce risk, and selling high volume to a large retailer is probably a simpler, safer deal than selling smaller volumes to a larger number of customers, even if at slightly higher prices. Companies want to move honey, not store it. On the retail end, retailers for their part always have a few "loss leaders" in their inventory to increase traffic into stores and will often price these items at or below cost. The small producer and the small consumer will always be at the mercy of big business. 

There is a great documentary ("Lawyers, Guns, and Honey") on the international honey business in the Netflix series "Rotten". A couple of points that the documentary makes:

1) The international consumption of honey exceeds the international production of honey.
2) The difference between the amount of honey consumed and the amount produced is made up by syrups added to real honey or are simply sold as honey.
3) Most of the fake honey comes from China.
4) After regulations reduced the flow of honey from China, businesses started transhipping it through third and fourth party countries.
5) There is a "Honey Police" that can determine if honey is pure or adulterated and can also determine the country of origin. (https://www.qsi-q3.com/?cn-reloaded=1)
6) Businesses and governments use services such as QSI to determine the quality of the honey they sell. 
7) There has been ongoing competition between the producers of fake honey and the quality control labs that test for it. The testers currently have the edge.
8) Costco and other large retailers have too much to lose if they were to be caught knowingly selling contaminated food products. 

A thought on cheap honey. One way of bumping up the value of a product is to refine it. Needles cost a lot more per pound than do horseshoes. Grape growers around the world have learned this lesson. If you want to increase the market value of your honey, a logical step would be to make mead from it.


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## GregB (Dec 26, 2017)

Jim_in_PA said:


> One thing that doesn't seem to have been said is how Costco's business model works...*they don't aim to make much or even any profit on the actual product in most cases.* .....


Exactly.
Many big businesses just maintain lists of "bait products" only to maintain the variety on the shelves.
The "bait products" ideally will only pay for themselves (OR not loose too much) - that is all required of them.
Honey is great at that - naturally has long shelf life, requires no refrigeration. 
Great stuff.

Think about it a minute when you are in a grocery store...
Which products in there are not paying for themselves (due to the overheads)?
Lots of them.
Point of all those lettuces and cucumbers to get the customer to come in to do the "one-stop" shopping done.

So, why the suprise about cheap honey again?
I am not surprised, if they are NOT making money from that cheap honey.
Keep in mind - COSTCO is a very large and diversified business entity - they are NOT making money from every product they sell.
They don't mean to.
As long as they have a *good general bottom line* - they are doing great.

With that, why again beeks are comparing themselves to COSTCO?
You, guys, are trying to compare oil and water.
Don't.

PS: I understand COSTCO undercuts the little guys as a side-affects; still - they are a big, diversified business and care much less of the honey pricing vs. the BS crowd


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## beesRus (Nov 15, 2018)

RE: "There is a great documentary ("Lawyers, Guns, and Honey") on the international honey business in the Netflix series 'Rotten'." Not to change the subject of this great discussion, but "Rotten" is a great series. If you watch the one on GARLIC, you will never look at garlic the same again!


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## Sharpbees (Jun 26, 2012)

I worked for a small blending plant at one time, they're profit was somewhere around .05/pound sold. They made money with volume of sales, we blended roughly 3 million pounds per month. Same thing with this. They buy up last years honey in volume at a lower price and make a profit on volume sold.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

Sell on taste, not price. It will be our job to inform and educate the consumer on the difference between the two products. It is our fault that things have gotten this far out of line.

Crazy Roland


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