10 Discontinued Costco Membership Perks We Want Back In 2026

With a Costco membership, you can enter any of its hundreds of warehouses around the world and access discounted prices on quality products ranging from olive oil and toilet paper to hearing aids and coats. You can even buy precious metals. Log onto the website, and the membership benefits multiply with access to help with home improvement projects, car shopping, travel planning, prescription medication, and insurance coverage, to name just a few. Throw in the free food samples and 2% annual rewards on certain purchases in-store and online (if you're an Executive member), and what is there to complain about?

Considering the existing perks, it is easy to forget that there is a downside to falling in love with a business that pulls products and severs services, especially when they appear popular and profitable. Some of Costco's changes receive a warm welcome – such as the introduction of digital membership cards and the practice of pre-scanning items when checkout lines are long. Other changes leave emotional scars. Just ask those still grieving the loss of Costco's Polish hot dog and combo pizza, and the bakery's assortment of jumbo muffins. Reddit is riddled with reactions to Costco products and services that have disappeared without warning or promise of return. These are just 10 of the discontinued membership perks we think deserve a comeback.

Considering how large Costco warehouses are – the world's largest Costco is 235,000 square feet — shopping can take time and energy. Longtime members remember a time when, to kick off the morning of intense shopping, shoppers were offered a hit of caffeine and sugar for the first hour of the day.

Just inside the doors, they could grab free juice, coffee, pastries, and, of course, muffins (well, part of a muffin, because it was back when Costco muffins were still jumbo-sized). Costco rarely explains the reasons why it discontinues a service or stops stocking a product. It's most likely that this particular perk was phased out once Costco began to grow. Or maybe customers abused the perk, going back for seconds and thirds, or littered the store with their cups and wrappers — there are limits to the greedy customer behaviors Costco will tolerate.

The most recent service to get cut at Costco was Costco Next. If you've never heard of it, you're not alone. A deal hunter's dream, the members-only website sold premium products directly from Costco suppliers such as EcoFlow, Nomatic, Anker, and Briggs & Riley. Members enjoyed deep discounts on top-of-the-line products, including safes, luggage, ebikes, and K-beauty products. The selection at any given time was limited, but the chance to score big with Hot Buys kept shoppers coming back to check for deals.

Some members didn't even know about the service at all until it ended, but others say they knew about it but never found any deals worth buying or were unimpressed with the discounts. Another complaint was that because the Costco Next link took shoppers to the retail partner's website, the purchases were no longer eligible for Costco's free returns or customer service.

Costco abruptly discontinued Costco Next at the end of August 2026. As with many other perks on this list, the retail giant didn't offer a warning or explanation of the changes. However, Costco management must know what they are doing since the company has grown into one of the world's biggest and fastest-growing retailers.

Costco is known for having one of the most generous return policies of any retailer. Believe it or not, it used to be even more lenient. Currently, the policy for electronics is a full refund if returned within 90 days, but there used to be no limit for everything except personal computers.

Take a moment to wrap your brain around what that meant. Your decade-old TV starts playing up? Bring it back to the store, get a full refund, and leave with an upgraded model. Your refrigerator is making noises after eight years? If you had the audacity to tell customer service you weren't satisfied, you could get a refund and use it to purchase a brand-new appliance. Turns out, many customers had no problem abusing the return policy, and in 2007, the retailer finally had to set limits to mitigate its losses, which totaled tens of millions of dollars.

While most other products can be returned at any time, the current limits on electronics apply to TVs, computers, cellphones, cameras, tablets, wearable tech, and large appliances. That 90-day return window also applies to Costco's most frequently returned appliances.

Costco is a trusted name, and dedicated members like the convenience of accessing multiple services under one roof. Costco is more than just a grocery store. Members can rent or buy a car, get insurance, plan a vacation, and, once upon a time, finance a mortgage through the warehouse club. Until 2022, the Costco Mortgage Program provided assistance with buying and financing a home, offering access to lenders with attractive rates. In fact, many people admitted that they joined Costco just to access the program. The cost savings more than paid for the membership fee.

One of the best benefits of the program was the origination fee limits. Basic members were guaranteed to be charged no more than $550, and Executive members' fees were capped at $250. Those who used the program for purchasing or refinancing homes loved the lower fees, which saved them hundreds of dollars.

But in the volatile housing market, the program didn't last. In May 2022, Costco pulled the plug on the mortgage program. Members lament the loss and wish the program would return. On the other hand, some people were likely happy to see the program canceled — namely, those working at competing lending companies, who had previously complained they just couldn't outmatch the retail giant's rates.

Costco warehouses closed in-store photo centers in 2021, but the online photo services continued to be a dependable source for ordering prints, cards, and photo books. But in 2023, Costco threw in the towel on all photo-related services and sent its customers to Shutterfly, a popular digital photo service.

Costco members were promised an exclusive 51% discount through Shutterfly, but weren't happy about the company's notoriously expensive shipping prices, which they had to pay on orders under $30. Costco's photo center website had always been the cheapest option for ordering quality prints and holiday cards.

Now, several years later, many customers still cannot find an acceptable alternative to match the quality, low prices, and convenience of Costco's online photo center. Many are growing even more frustrated with Shutterfly and yearn for the days when their Christmas cards didn't come with watermark logos, and they didn't have to pay a fee to remove logos from their photobooks.

Costco's inventory can vary among different locations, so when a product is pulled from one warehouse, it might still be found at another. While the majority of Costco warehouses do not have permanent book sections today, it wasn't so long ago that they did.

Costco's book displays were a wonderland for readers who like to get their hands on a book and flip through its pages before buying it. Unlike in a traditional bookstore, which typically displays books on a shelf with the spine facing out, the books were scattered cover-side up on a long, low table, where the colorful covers and intriguing titles lured even the most reluctant readers. Stacks of exclusive box sets of children's fiction and nonfiction books, special-edition novels, discounted best-sellers, and unique coffee table books were often priced to beat Amazon and Barnes & Noble. 

Then the pandemic hit, and high-touch areas were cleared out, and at many locations, the wide selection of books and magazines never returned. Other warehouses nurtured successful book sections even as Amazon put brick-and-mortar bookstores out of business. Finally, in late 2024, it was reported that stocking and maintaining the displays was too time-consuming and announced books would become an end-of-the-year seasonal offering only. A lucky 100 locations were able to continue stocking books year-round, but the company's decision left many of its millions of members wishing Costco would begin a new chapter and bring the books back permanently.

Costco's MO is to make changes without warning. Even employees are often left in the dark until the last minute. That's what happened to the popular Costco membership perk of in-store coffee grinders. Plenty of coffee aficionados are against pre-grinding coffee beans, but those less fastidious coffee drinkers who didn't want to shell out for their own equipment loved the convenience of quickly grinding the bag of whole coffee beans they just purchased on an industrial-sized machine.

Many store employees held a different opinion of the complimentary service. The grinders were a hassle to clean and maintain, especially since many users were inconsiderate and ignored the instructions for use. People were spotted putting nuts and even dog food through the machine, causing food allergy contamination risks, not to mention the overall ick factor. Also dangerous was the fact that cleaning brushes and scissors would accidentally drop and get stuck in the gears. It wasn't uncommon to see signs indicating that they were out for repair.

Eventually, it seems some store managers hit their limit with the plague of mess and didn't bring them back after their temporary removal during the pandemic. By 2025, more and more stores had scrapped their machines. Now, it seems like Costco's era of carefree (and careless) coffee bean grinding has ground to a halt. The ultimate example of "this is why we can't have nice things."

Black Friday has become Black November with online shopping deals typically outshining in-store deals. But back in the heyday of Black Friday doorbuster deals, one of the most sought-after was a freebie for Costco shoppers. In the 2000s and some of the 2010s, "The Costco Way" — a collection of hundreds of recipes featuring Costco products — was the ultimate Black Friday prize. It was a highly coveted, first-come, first-served thrill of a deal. It became a tradition for loyal customers to brave the frantic scrum to snag one first thing the day after Thanksgiving. For some, the recipe-packed incentive was the only reason they even stopped by Costco that day.

But in 2014, the giveaway ended. For several years, the cookbook recipes were available on the Costco website. When they were eventually removed, fans of "The Costco Way" shared digital files of the entire cookbook series. Nowadays, Costco recipes are featured, a few at a time, in the monthly "Costco Connection" member magazine. And while younger cooks tend to get recipes online and from social media– like creative appetizers that use Costco's mozzarella sticks and easy weeknight meals using Costco rotisserie chickens – long-time club members miss the giftable hard copy cookbooks, and the thrill of scoring the most coveted doorbuster of the year.

Not only do you need a membership to shop at Costco, but you also need the right credit card. The retailer only accepts one credit card brand in its U.S. stores. While this was once American Express, it is now Visa. Costco also offers its own Visa credit card, the Costco Anywhere card with Citi, which offers 2% cashback on purchases at Costco and 5% on Costco gas. The partnership also comes with additional benefits such as a roadside assistance hotline and car rental insurance. But there was a time when shoppers could enjoy an even more useful perk: extended warranty.

The loss of an extended warranty on Costco purchases has upset some credit card holders. Until January 2023, Costco credit card holders automatically received a 24-month extended warranty on top of the limited warranty provided by manufacturers of certain items purchased at Costco. This made it much less risky to invest in expensive items such as TVs. Sadly, this is one perk that's now disappeared into the Costco abyss.

One of Costco's most popular membership benefits is the Costco Travel portal, which unlocks exclusive discounts, bonuses, and extra rewards on vacation packages. Members used to turn to the resource when planning a Disneyland theme park vacation to streamline the process, but also to access exclusive bonuses. Past perks included collectible pins and lanyards, Disney dining discounts, character dining vouchers, photo packages, and Disney gift cards, usually valued at $200 to $300. And then, in 2025, the magic spell broke, with Costco halting its Disneyland packages.

The good news is that some Disneyland packages are once again available through the Costco Travel portal. In October 2026, Costco debuted a 2026 Disneyland deal that includes discounted tickets but lackluster perks compared to packages of years past. While it included two-day Park Hopper passes, a Lightning Lane Multi Pass, and a $60 dining card, it also came with a new usage limit — tickets must be used within 13 days of the first visit. While the most recent deal represents at least $150 in savings, members are disappointed that the likes of high-value gift cards, exclusive collectible pins, and magical souvenirs included with past packages seem to have disappeared.