Sams Club vs Meat Market

BigA · May 2010

I was at my local sams club and noticed that the brisket was over $2.50 less per pound and the pork butts were $.50 per pound vs the meat market. As a cost point this is huge, is the quality as good or better than the meat market. They probably get the meat from the same place???

Celtic Wolf · May 2010

A qualified - Yes. Grade for grade the quality is equal.

Remember your meat market is NOT of the same purchase volume as the warehouse stores.

fishlessman · May 2010

are you talking local butcher or the meat market chain. the meat market has meats you cant buy at your sams like 45 day dry aged beef, i dont know another place to buy beef like that as cheap. for what its worth i dont trust sams club

Fidel · May 2010

If you're talking pork butt, then the quality is going to be pretty much equal.

Brisket will be graded according the the USDA scale of select < choice < prime. As long as you are comparing two choice cuts of meat, then they should be reasonably close in quality although there can be a marked difference between two pieces of meat each graded as "choice".

Big cuts like those and sub-primals I usually purchase from various membership wholesale clubs. If I am buying ground beef, chicken parts, fish, steaks, ribs, or smaller cuts or pork or beef I almost always choose to support the little guy. I really like my local butcher shops and try to throw them as much business as I can, but like you have noticed there is a big price jump that can be hard to justify. For example I get briskets at a local membership club for $1.79 per pound. My butcher charges $3.99. For a 15 pound brisket that is a nearly $35 difference by the time you figure in sales tax. But I have always paid more for whole turkeys (about double) at my butcher, but I get locally raised, never frozen, non-enhanced turkey that was walking around less than 48 hours before I pick it up. That quality difference makes the extra cash worth it.

Tennisbum · May 2010

I shop at Sam's for all my bigger cuts, like brisket, butts, and whole pork tenderloin. I spoke to the butcher there and he said the pork was not enhanced so that sort of pushed me in that direction. Get chicken, ground beef etc at the local grocery store where we shop.
I too have a difficult time justifying the cost difference.
gp

Hungry Celeste · May 2010

I gladly pay more per pound for non-CAFO beef...my solution to the price difference: eat less meat, but go for locally raised, locally slaughtered beef & pork. I like the taste of grass-fed rather than corn-finished.

Hungry in Lilburn · May 2010

I broke my rule about not buying from WalMarts yesterday (it was raining and I didn't want to double back to Kroger's) and bought a pork butt from wallyworld. Went to Kroger's today to pick up 4 chickens to spatchcock (people are actually paying me to cook food for them now!) and checked out the Kroger butts just for kicks. $0.40/lb cheaper! DOH!(Homer). And frankly, the butts looked better at Kroger's as well. Well like my dad use to tell me when I was a lad "son, the rain will not hurt you, not everything that starts with the letter "S" is sugar."

Sams Club vs Meat Market

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