For The Best Costco Ground Beef, Buy It At This Time Of Year

Costco butchers may not custom-cut meat for you, but they will let you in on the little-known secret about the best time of year to buy ground beef from the wholesaler. If you think about it, there must be certain seasons during which there tends to be more unsold, high-quality steak that can then get ground up and sold. And indeed, there are!

One Reddit commenter wrote that an employee from the meat department once said that the best time to buy Costco ground beef is right after major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas. It makes sense. Costco has to order enough steaks to make sure there's more than enough supply for holiday shoppers. But once the holidays are over, any leftover high-quality meat reportedly goes right into the grinder, meaning that's some fancy ground beef you're getting toward the end of the year.

An employee who makes burgers for Costco confirmed that this is the case. Writing on Reddit, "A couple days after Thanksgiving and Christmas when people stop buying rib roasts and they hit their sell-by date, we grind them first thing in the morning. Best burger we make."

While the holiday season may be the absolute best time of year to buy ground beef from Costco, there are a few more tips to keep in mind if you're shopping at another time and still want to score the best-quality meat possible. Another employee from the meat department wrote that Costco butchers don't just grind up nice steaks around the holidays. "Usually the first grind of the day is used with steaks from the one or two days before," they wrote. 

Another employee confirmed that "any steaks left over from the previous day ... must be ground and sold before 2 p.m." So the earlier in the day you get to the meat department and make your selection, the better the chance you're getting high-quality meat. Depending on how much value you place on getting superior ground beef, it may be worth it to you to get an executive membership, which offers early shopping privileges. 

Costco's meat selection is comprehensive, and there are some meats you should definitely buy and others we recommend avoiding. If you are considering buying the ground beef, you do have to buy 6 pounds of it at a time, so in addition to making sure you're getting the best meat possible, there's a tried-and-true way to make it worth it. All you have to do is portion it out and freeze it when you bring it home. That way, you can thaw and use a pound or two at a time for your chili, bolognese, or burger night!