Costco Way

Except that a different Costco, could be 40 miles away.

Depending where you live, 40 miles may mean nothing or it can be a royal pain.

Again Why has the software to program the hearing aid. So if another Costco will attach the 100 dB receiver, he/her is good to go.

Secondly, the Philips hearing aid can be programmed remotely, and I believe most if not all of the other hearing aids they sell can be programmed remotely.

Has anyone had remote programming with Costco? Can one switch to a new Costco location just for remote programming?

Costco does REM and would not the switch receiver strength without an in-person fitting for the new receivers.

Yes, I believe someone posted that they had their Jabra hearing aids adjusted remotely.

Well if Costco is attaching the 100 dB receivers, then it’s likely they are going to do another REM. However, it’s not necessary to do another REM if you self-program your hearing aids.

To be honest, the manufacturer’s recommendations for coupling and receiver specification are often not the right ones in practice.

In the absence of an audiogram and with the tiny screenshots you’ve provided from the software I can think of some potentially legitimate reasons for why your Costco audiologist may have made the decisions that they did. Given that the higher cost of 100 gain receivers in a custom shell is usually passed onto the client with additional margin I’d be surprised if cost was your audiologists’ primary motivator.

Unfortunately, using frequency lowering in an asymmetric manner is generally a recipe for failure and I hope they don’t do that again.

I definitely have significant asymmetrical hearing loss. At Costco I saw 2 hearing specialist. I spent 6 months with the first, and the first did try frequency shifting on the left ear only and had me listen to music playing to compare. It distorted the sound, and made matters worse.

Then for the last 1.5 months I was seeing the Manager/Hearing Specialist because I had complained that my left ear was still not properly fit after 6 months of a dozen or more visits. I made the HA mgr aware that the asymmetrical frequency shifting did not work, and requested trying the Philips recommended fitting of the 100db receiver for left ear with sufficient amplification to try that. Her response was the other hearing specialist was NOT supposed to do that demonstration.

I think what everybody is missing as far as cost, is they are only looking at the raw costs of an 85db vs 100db receiver, and not the service costs requiring additional Costco time to dial in the hearing aids. The 100db receiver change would require another REM calibration to fit it in place of 85db. This Costco is very busy with HA customers, and the Costco model is to sell HA’s by doing a quick cookie cutter first fit, rather than dial them in for asymmetrical loss. They scheduled a 2 week follow up after first fitting, and in a wishful thinking way, said you don’t have to come back if you are happy with first fit, just let us know.

I have read Hearing Aids are the number 2 revenue generation for Costco, second only to alcohol. So selling aids is a huge revenue generation for Costco, and servicing clients eats into that profit model. This Costco won’t schedule follow up adjustment appointments closer than 2-3 weeks apart, as they reserve slots for potential new customers.

The statement I made about MPO is lifted from the article I posted above, which was authored by Widex’s Hearing Research Engineerings and Audiologists.

@DrCleff said:

I have read Hearing Aids are the number 2 revenue generation for Costco

Where did you hear that? Seems extremely unlikely. Pretty sure they’ve made more selling me fig bars than hearing aids.

Fig bars?!? Are they good? How do they compare to fig newtons?

@DrCleff said:

6 months of a dozen or more visits.

Hmmm. After a lot fewer visits than that I felt uncomfortable in asking for more. The fitter was/is the most accommodating guy in the world and went above and beyond.,. but even he implied that really difficult fits are not in Costco’s business model.

Rightly or wrongly it seems, they decided that if you were going to take your business elsewhere they weren’t going to try to stop you.

So, based on the article you shared, Costco sells 2 (TWO) hearing aid sets per day per store, not 8 as I assumed.
So let’s redo the math:
2 pairs of HAs per day/store = $1600/HAs x 2 pairs/day = $3,200/day/store
At a 10% margin, that’s $320 profit/day/store.
Now explain to me, how can 2 hearing aid sets per store per day be the 2nd highest revenue maker for Costco?
I’m sure the food court generates more revenue than that!
Numbers don’t lie.

@OcramSagev said:

Now explain to me, how can 2 hearing aid sets per store per day be the 2nd highest revenue maker for Costco?
I’m sure the food court generates more revenue than that!

Exactly.

Then there’s this from Perplexity:

Costco earned approximately $4.8 billion in membership fees for the fiscal year ending September 1, 2024, which represents a significant portion of the company’s profits and allows them to keep product prices low. In the fiscal year before that, the company generated around $4.6 billion in membership fees.

Key Details about Costco’s Membership Fees

Profit Driver:

Membership fees are a crucial part of Costco’s business model, with fee revenue often making up the bulk of the company’s profits

Bottom line: Many have speculated that hearing aids are a loss leader for Costco, driving loyalty and encouraging oldsters to never leave the store with less than a fully-loaded cart. That’s at least plausible rather than laughable.

This chart perhaps explains why this forum has a lot of Left Coast Costco HA members…..

The reason is price, price, price. It’s no secret. A premium hearing aid at Costco costs between $1,500 and $1,600. The equivalent hearing aid would cost between $4,000 and $6,000 at a private practice.

However, most if not all Costco’s will not spend hours fine turning your hearing aid. To be fair, most private audiologists will not spend hours fine tuning your hearing aid either. Costco works out well if the manufacture’s settings work well enough for you.

I truly believe most folks are using poorly adjusted hearing aids, unfortunately folks don’t know how much better their hearing aids can sound. Anyhow, that’s been my personal experience.

Why it’s time to move on. You shot yourself in the foot by returning the hearing aids before seeking an alternative.

I’m sure you will find that audiologist that will work with you. Good luck on your journey.