Landing a job at Costco Wholesale could be within reach with the right certifications, resume, and degree. There are full-time and part-time jobs at Costco available for those who dream of working at the multinational corporation. According to the National Retail Federation, Costco Wholesale is recognized as the third-largest retailer in the world (as of 2025).1 Costco careers offer opportunities for professional growth—from member services and warehouse operations to pharmacists and IT professionals. This article offers suggestions on how to get a Costco job in 2025.
The article will walk you through the Costco application process and eligibility requirements. It also provides a list of available Costco jobs and information about the benefits you may receive while working at Costco.
Key Takeaways
- Landing a career at Costco is achievable, especially at the entry level.
- Working at Costco is generally considered rewarding, with competitive wages and benefits.
- The Costco hiring process typically includes interviews, a drug test, and possibly an orientation week.
- To apply for Costco employment, search for open roles on their website, download and fill out the application, and submit it.
- Having a reference from a current employee can significantly improve your chances of getting hired.
- Costco offers a variety of career opportunities, including part-time warehouse roles and corporate roles in its Washington headquarters.
- Benefits for Costco employees include health insurance, life insurance, 401k plans, health savings accounts, and flexible spending accounts.
Costco: Company Background
Costco Wholesale Corporation was founded in 1983 in Seattle, Washington. It’s a membership warehouse club with a chain of warehouses that sell wholesale products and is the third-largest retailer in the world today.1 According to Wikipedia, as of July 2025, Costco operates 905 warehouse stores worldwide.2 Costco is currently present in 14 countries and had net sales of $249.6 billion in 2024, according to their 2024 annual report.3
There are various departments at Costco stores, such as the pharmacy, food court, bakery, and deli. Some branches also have gas stations, tire garages, and other services.
How Hard Is It to Land a Job at Costco?
It is not too hard to land a job at Costco, especially at the entry level. You can land a high-paying job without a high school diploma at Costco. The entire hiring process takes about two weeks and involves two to three interviews, a drug test, and possibly an orientation week. According to Indeed.com, it’s easier to land a job at Costco if you have a good recommendation or if the warehouse is new.
Your chances of working at Costco will improve significantly if you have a reference from a current employee. According to a former hiring manager at Costco, the applications are listed chronologically in the database, so the sooner you apply for an open position, the better your chances of working at Costco are.
How to Apply for a Job at Costco
- Look for open roles. You can look for open roles on Costco’s website or on job boards like Glassdoor or Indeed. It would be wise to subscribe to their email list to get alerts for Costco jobs—offering you the option to apply early.
- Get your application form. You can download the Costco application online or get it directly from a Costco warehouse. Your application remains active for 90 days.
- Fill in your Costco application. On the online application, you can apply for a specific position or a location near you. Answer all questions as accurately as possible.
- Get a great recommendation. If you already know a Costco employee, use them as a reference. If you don’t, it’s best to find someone willing to recommend you.
- Send in your application. After filling in the application accurately and getting a good recommendation, you can submit your Costco job application and wait for an interview.
Costco Application Process
The Costco application process for landing a Costco position usually begins with a phone call to schedule an interview with one or two hiring managers. This interview may consist of a question-and-answer session, after which successful applicants are called back for a second or third one-on-one interview.
The entire length of time it takes to apply for a Costco job and move through the stages can vary drastically based on the department you’re applying to, the location (whether in-store or corporate headquarters), and may depend on seasonal demand.
Costco Interview Questions
When applying at Costco, it’s important to prepare for the interview stage. Doing so will allow you to be calm and composed during the interview and provide quality answers to the interviewer’s questions. Below are some common general interview questions asked during a typical interview for both full-time and part-time positions.
- Can you describe a time you displayed teamwork?
- Why do you want to work here?
- Can you discuss a time when you had to deal with conflict in the workplace?
- What is the best way to handle an angry or difficult customer?
- What are your strengths and weaknesses?
Applying for Costco Jobs: Tips for Success
- Show entrepreneurial drive. This core value of Costco means its team members are motivated to carry out the company’s mission in all aspects of their work. Hiring managers will look to find this quality in applicants.
- Update your resume. Keep your resume updated with your prior work experiences and related skills. This allows you to apply quickly when new jobs are posted.
- Apply often. Applying regularly to open positions (every three months or so) keeps your resume at the top for consideration.
- Visit the store in person. Popping into the location where you want to work after submitting an online application could help put you on the store manager’s radar and get you an interview sooner.
- Call upon your network. Landing a job at Costco is easier if you have a current employee who can refer you. If you know someone already working at Costco, see if they can do you a favor and recommend you to the hiring manager.
Flexible Costco Jobs: Part-Time Opportunities
Keep in mind, this is a short list, and many of these opportunities vary based on location and time of year.
- Cashier. Cashiers at Costco work in a fast-paced environment and have key responsibilities such as processing transactions, handling payments, and providing customer service. Cashiers are also hired on a seasonal basis during peak holiday times.
- Bakery wrapper. A bakery wrapper handles products in the Costco bakery department by wrapping, garnishing, and labeling bakery products.4
- Stocker. This stocker job with Costco involves merchandise restocking on the retail shelves, ensuring the aisles are kept clean and clear, and helping Costco members find products throughout the store.
- Call center representative. Costco call center jobs such as this one are responsible for handling customer service inquiries. A call center representative earns an average of $39,101 annually, according to Indeed.5
- Forklift operator. A forklift operator is responsible for unloading shipments and restocking the pallets of products in the warehouse. This role is also offered as a part- or full-time position at Costco.
Costco Career Opportunities: Job Titles and Descriptions
Costco has many career opportunities, depending on your interests and skill set. Jobs include information technology, distribution, accounting, finance, marketing, human resources, and more. An ideal candidate possesses one major quality when it comes to career opportunities: Do the right thing. Costco’s website states, “Since our founding, Costco has operated under the guiding principle of doing the right thing – for our members, our employees, our suppliers, our communities, and the environment. We understand that when we do the right thing, good things happen.”6
Again, these are some employment opportunities that Costco has listed in the past. Always check the job board on their website to see current openings.
IT Portfolio Manager
This job requires managing and reporting the project portfolio and resource capacity at the enterprise level. You will have to improve the existing portfolio and create project management processes, practices, work products, templates, and tools required to achieve business targets. You will collaborate with other IT managers, stakeholders, and business analysts.
IT Product Owner – Ecommerce Business Services
This role requires experience working on an Agile or Waterfall team, creating communication documentation, and expertise in utilizing standard documentation tools. An Agile product owner certification is preferred. Additionally, you will partner with product management stakeholders to work on creating a prioritized backlog of user stories and more.
IT Product Owner – Manufacturing
The job description involves consulting with the business to capture, prioritize, and justify technology needs and issues. As well as facilitating the delivery solutions, the IT product owner helps define project scope and specifications and coordinates with other teams to ensure that all requirements are met for technical delivery.
Senior IT Vendor Manager
This professional role involves executing the supplier management and contract lifecycle. This is a managerial position in a fast-paced team environment that requires the identification, classification, risk assessment, procurement, evaluation, renewal, and decommissioning of suppliers.
IT Operations Analyst – Ecommerce
The job description for this position involves coordination, escalation, communication, and resolution of high-priority ecommerce incidents. The position also requires trend identification, metric definition, related efforts to decrease service disruption, and commitment to excellence.
Network Engineer
Candidates must work hard to perform analysis and other tasks related to supporting Costco’s enterprise network infrastructure in a retail setting. This involves ensuring minimum downtime to internal customers by effectively partnering with service providers and stakeholders to identify the root cause and find solutions for networking problems.
Network Support Specialist
This position involves performing tasks required to configure, analyze, implement, design, and support Costco’s voice network infrastructure, with a primary focus on Cisco UC solutions. Candidates work closely with application development and infrastructural areas to create detailed designs and execution of strategic solutions.
Client Hardware Support – Support Analyst
This job title requires the employee to provide high-quality customer service regarding issues related to client hardware-supported equipment in warehouses, deports, ancillary businesses, and corporate and regional offices. Equipment may include printers, iPads, RF scanners, UPS, and window clients.
IT Service Desk Technical Support Representative (TSR)
If you are hired as a Service Desk Technical Support Representative (TSR), you would work directly with Costco partners, employees, and vendors in the US and Canada. Work would include diagnosing, troubleshooting, and solving IT system issues.
Does Costco Offer Remote Jobs?
As of July 2025, there are no remote Costco jobs as part of their workforce. Costco also does not currently have a work-from-home policy in place for its corporate staff, but always check their job board as this may change in the future.
What’s It Like to Work at Costco?
Costco jobs offer employees a healthy, inclusive, and supportive work environment.
Working at Costco can involve a lot of manual labor, which can be exhausting. However, it can also be rewarding. According to employee reviews via Glassdoor, working at Costco means being valued as an employee, getting top-tier health care, enjoying the company of co-workers, and being compensated fairly for the work you do.7
Costco Benefits
- Health Insurance. Costco provides industry-leading health insurance to its employees.8 Employees receive private health and dental plans, along with extended health care and vision insurance, as of July 2025.
- Life Insurance. Costco offers its employees basic and supplemental life insurance, although it’s not applicable for seasonal workers.
- 401(k) Plans + Employee Stock Purchase Plans. Costco offers attractive 401(k) programs to workers to assist them in saving for retirement. You have the option of determining how much you want to contribute to your pension account with each paycheck.
- Health Savings Account (HSA). Costco employee benefits allow team members to open a health savings account (HSA). The money in this account is set aside before taxes to pay for qualified medical expenses.
- Flexible Spending Account (FSA). Costco offers its employees a flexible spending account (FSA) that they can use for out-of-pocket health care costs. You don’t have to pay taxes on this amount in your FSA.
- College Student Retention Program. This program allows Costco employees to maintain their tenure while pursuing a degree.
What Does It Take to Get a Job at Costco?
It takes good planning to get a job at Costco. According to Forbes, Costco is one of the best large employers of 2025, based primarily on survey responses from more than 217,000 employees working at companies within the U.S.9 Because of this, the competition is tough as thousands of job seekers apply for the same Costco jobs every day.
To land an exciting career at Costco, apply for available roles as soon as possible and regularly. If your application is selected for the next step, prepare for the various interviews that will arise throughout the remainder of the Costco application process. Call upon your network for anyone who knows a current Costco employee to give you a referral and improve your chances of getting hired.
How to Get a Job at Costco FAQ
Costco hires employees who are aged 18 years or older for roles as cashiers, cashier assistants, or in the membership department. Some further jobs in the warehouse may require professionals to be older due to the nature of the work or the training or education requirements.
"Career Karma entered my life when I needed it most and quickly helped me match with a bootcamp. Two months after graduating, I found my dream job that aligned with my values and goals in life!"
Venus, Software Engineer at Rockbot
The easiest job at Costco is a front-end assistant, and most entry-level jobs start at this position. Other jobs that are relatively easy for employees at Costco include all entry-level employees, like cashier assistant, food service assistant, food court worker, or customer service representative.
Yes, you can walk into Costco and apply for a job. You can walk up to the counter and ask for a job application for any open positions at any Costco warehouse or store.
Sources:
- 1 https://nrf.com/research-insights/top-retailers/top-100-retailers/top-100-retailers-2025-list
- 2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Costco#Locations
- 3 https://s201.q4cdn.com/287523651/files/doc_financials/2024/ar/COST-2024-Annual-Report.pdf
- 4 https://www.indeed.com/cmp/Costco-Wholesale/reviews?fjobtitle=Wrapper
- 5 https://www.indeed.com/cmp/Costco-Wholesale/salaries/Call-Center-Representative?period=yearly
- 6 https://www.costco.com/our-values.html
- 7 https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Costco-Wholesale-Reviews-E2590.htm
- 8 https://careers.costco.com/why-costco#:~:text=and%20career%20growth.-,Benefits,are%20also%20eligible%20for%20coverage.
- 9 https://www.forbes.com/lists/best-large-employers/
About us: Career Karma is a platform designed to help job seekers find, research, and connect with job training programs to advance their careers. Learn about the CK publication.
