12 Facts About Costco's Rotisserie Chicken You Need to Know
Few things are as satisfying as a supermarket rotisserie chicken. When done right, the birds are perfectly cooked and seasoned, the skin is crispy, and they're ready to take home and serve. However, if there's one star of the pack, it's Costco's rotisserie chicken, which costs just $4.99 and is bigger than many birds you'll find at other grocery stores.
The deli department mainstay has garnered a cult-like following, with Costco selling 137 million chickens in 2023. If you haven't yet hopped on the bandwagon, you might want to consider getting a Costco membership card and picking one up for dinner. Here are some facts about Costco's rotisserie chicken you'll want to know before heading over to the warehouse.
Costco hasn't raised the price since 2009
The famous $4.99 chicken made its official Costco debut in 1994. Aside from a brief dollar increase in 2008 during the Great Recession, Costco has remained committed to keeping the chicken's price steady despite ongoing inflation.
Costco's Chief Financial Officer Richard Galanti said in 2023 that the warehouse club kept its rotisserie chicken priced at $4.99 as "an investment in low prices to drive membership, to drive sales in a big way."
The chicken is allegedly sold at a loss
Costco's rotisserie chicken is reportedly a "loss leader"—a product sold below its actual market value to attract customers to the store, where they'll hopefully purchase other profitable items.
In 2015, Galanti said, "When others were raising their chicken prices from $4.99 to $5.99, we were willing to eat, if you will, $30 to $40 million a year in gross margin by keeping it at $4.99." However, in 2019, Jeff Lyons, Costco's senior vice president of fresh foods, declined to tell CNN whether the retailer still loses money on its rotisserie chickens.
Sales have more than doubled in the last decade
Costco's famous bird continues to grow in popularity. During fiscal year 2010, Costco sold 51 million rotisserie chickens. In 2022, that figure was 117 million, and in 2023, it was a whopping 137 million.
You'll always find the chicken in the back of the store
You don't have to visit every Costco in America to know that you'll always find the rotisserie chicken in the back of the warehouse. That's because its placement is a corporate strategy.
The idea is that as customers make their way to the back of the store for the rotisserie chicken, they will pass through several aisles, picking up plenty of other, more expensive items along the way.
You can't roast it yourself for any cheaper
Theoretically, the cheapest way to buy chicken is by picking up the whole uncooked bird because you won't be paying for someone to cut it into parts or cook it for you. However, that's not true at Costco, where the rotisserie chickens are actually cheaper than whole, uncooked birds.
A whole raw organic chicken at the warehouse can weigh as much as five pounds. Recently priced at $2.99 per pound, that works out to almost three times as much as the pre-cooked bird!
They typically weigh around 3 lbs
While the rotisserie birds you might find at a supermarket typically weigh around two pounds, Costco's chicken clocks in at around three pounds. You might even bring home a bird that's more than three pounds, making the $4.99 price point an even bigger bargain.
Its spices are still a mystery
According to the label, Costco's rotisserie chicken is made with 10 ingredients: whole chicken, water, and seasonings (salt, sodium phosphate, modified food starch, potato dextrin, carrageenan, sugar, dextrose, spice extractives).
If you're hoping to find out what exact spices are used in the chicken's seasoning, you're out of luck. Costco has yet to share which ones are included in the "spice extractives."
There's a secret way to know if a new batch is ready
In case you're concerned about Costco running out of its rotisserie chicken before you can make your way to the back of the store, we've got it on good authority that when you hear the bell ringing from the Costco deli, it means a fresh batch is ready. Now go—before the other shoppers beat you to it!
It's gluten-free
Unlike some rotisserie chicken that's made with flour to help the skin crisp up, Costco proudly labels its rotisserie chickens "gluten-free," which is great for customers who may have a gluten sensitivity.
Costco has its own chicken plant
In October 2019, Costco purchased a 400,000-square-foot poultry processing plant in Fremont, Neb., for $450 million in an effort to keep the price of its chicken low. According to CNN, the retailer said bringing production in-house will save the company up to 35 cents per bird, with Costco aiming to process about two million birds per week. This has made Costco the first retailer to control its entire chicken supply chain.
A celebrity chef criticized it
The rotisserie chicken was the center of controversy back in 2023 when chef, restaurateur, and television personality David Chang criticized the popular item in an episode of his podcast The David Chang Show.
"I got a hot take—I think the Costco chicken is the worst rotisserie chicken," he said. "They're not good. They're not seasoned." He added, "The reason why it's important to have it properly seasoned is, you might eat it the next day cold—and it's gotta taste good cold. And there's something about all the nitrates and all the crap they pump into that chicken that makes that chicken breast even more disgusting the next day when it's cold… It's inedible. It really is."
There are countless ways to eat it
Whether you like to shred your rotisserie chicken for quesadillas, add it to homemade chicken noodle soup, or eat it straight off the bones, Costco's rotisserie chicken has mealtime covered. For some additional recipe inspiration, check out these 17 Healthy, Easy Meals You Can Make With a Costco Rotisserie Chicken.
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