Should You Buy Your Thanksgiving Turkey at Costco?

Figuring out where to buy your bird is vitally important when you're planning your Thanksgiving meal. After all, your turkey is the centerpiece of the table and you want a great one -- but you also don't want to end up draining your checking account just for a little bit of juicy white and dark meat.

The good news is, there are plenty of options out there for where to buy a turkey that won't leave you in credit card debt. Costco is one of them -- but should you shop for your turkey there or look elsewhere?

Is buying your turkey at Costco a good idea?

There are definitely some benefits to buying a turkey at Costco. For one thing, prices tend to be very competitive. In past years, Costco charged $0.99 per pound for turkeys weighing in between 12 and 20 pounds. These were good-quality name-brand turkeys, too, raised with no antibiotics and from big names in the turkey game like Butterball.

Currently, however, Costco's only turkey offering is a $49.99 Quality Ethnic Foods Halal Frozen Whole Young Turkey that weighs between 13 and 15 pounds. That's not a bad price (at $3.33 a pound for a 15-pound bird), but it's more expensive than frozen turkeys offered by other big box stores like Walmart. Remember, though, this is for a kosher turkey, so a different standard applies.

Costco usually gets its fresh, never-frozen turkeys in at the local stores around a week before Thanksgiving. And based on past years, those birds are likely to come in at a lower price point that's more on par with what other stores offer.

Costco also offers a full turkey dinner kit priced at $269.99, which serves eight to 10 people and includes the turkey. However, this is currently sold out and it's too late to pre-order, so if you were hoping for that option, it's off the table until next year.

Great turkeys can be found elsewhere, too

If you missed out on Costco's big turkey dinner kit or if you want just the bird itself and don't want to wait until the warehouse club happens to get them in, you have plenty of other options for where to shop.

As mentioned above, Walmart has good deals on turkeys -- and chances are good your local grocery store will as well. In fact, many grocery stores offer special programs where you can earn points toward a free turkey. Costco does not provide anything like that, and if you're hoping to save money on your Thanksgiving meal, researching stores in your area that will comp your turkey if you meet their spending requirements could make a whole lot more sense.

If you do decide that you want to shop at Costco for this crucial item, consider calling ahead to see when exactly your warehouse club is going to be getting turkeys in and to find out what the price will be for the 2023 Thanksgiving season. That way, you can make sure you don't waste a trip and you can compare the cost to what competitors charge to get the very best deal possible for your personal finances. With the expensive holiday season fast approaching, every penny counts.