Costco Wholesale continues online boom in April

A March sales update from wholesaler Costco teased an online increase in sales by 50%, and in its April update, that number only grew, measuring an 87.7% bump in online sales during the four weeks ended May 3.

For that same period, Costco Wholesale Corp. said same stores sales registered even at 0% (unlike the near 12% gain in March) while Canada stores saw a drop by 5%. 

Net sales landed at $11.39 billion for April.

The company cited issues from the coronavirus pandemic as impacting April sales negatively. Stay-at-home orders, social distancing restrictions and some mandatory closures led to decreased traffic and sales in its warehouses. Limited service in Travel and food courts, closures of most of optical, hearing aid and photo departments, and lower volume and price deflation in gasoline business negatively impacted April sales by an estimated 12 percentage points, of which approximately 70% related to gasoline, the retailer said.