Why Costco Parking Lots Bring Out the Worst in People

There's a reason Costco parking lots have become their own genre of comedy material. San Diego comic Mal Hall has a bit that reliably kills at shows across the country — the universal experience of circling a Costco lot on a Saturday, watching your own patience evaporate in real time.

Hall isn't exaggerating for the stage, either. Once a week, he loads his three kids into the car for a five-minute drive to Costco, and if he can't snag a spot right away, he parks way out in the far reaches of the lot and walks the rest of the way with his kids, bypassing rows of frustrated drivers still circling. What gets him is watching people who'll happily walk miles inside the store refuse to walk an extra thirty seconds from their car — muscling a full-size truck into a spot a compact could've taken, just to shave off a little distance.

It's Not Just Bad Luck — It's Bad Design And Bad Behavior

Part of the problem is structural. Parking engineers point out that plenty of Costco lots have become victims of their own popularity — warehouses outgrowing their footprint, older locations with outdated layouts, or lots shared with neighboring retail stores.

But plenty of the chaos isn't Costco's fault at all — it's just people behaving badly. In crowded urban lots especially, shoppers have turned finding a spot into something resembling a competition: tailgating other shoppers back to their cars and blocking the aisle in the process, sending a passenger out early to physically "claim" an open spot, or parking illegally in areas reserved for tire service just to be closer to the entrance.

Some tactics have gone viral for being especially brazen — one couple has racked up millions of views for driving straight over a curb and sidewalk to cut into the lot, sometimes beating out drivers who were already lined up. Others hog multiple spots despite Costco's already-generous sizing; one shopper reportedly brought a traffic cone just to claim a second space. And plenty of shoppers abandon their carts loose in empty spots instead of walking them to a corral, making it harder for the next person to park at all.

When Frustration Turns Into Confrontation

Most of what plays out online is closer to secondhand embarrassment than real danger — grown adults having full meltdowns over a parking space. But it doesn't always stay harmless.

Hope Maria, who grew up in a small Idaho town without a Costco nearby, got her first real taste of parking lot hostility after moving to the Bay Area, where another driver once screamed at her while she was simply trying to back out of her own spot. Since then, she parks as far from the entrance as possible, specifically to avoid conflict.

It can escalate well past dirty looks, too. In Danville, California, a fight over a parking space sent one man to the hospital. At a Costco in British Columbia, one dispute reportedly involved a woman brandishing a machete.

Costco Is Actually Trying To Fix This

The company is well aware parking is a real deterrent for some shoppers — frustrating enough that it's come up during shareholder meetings. Longtime member Christine Ma-Kellams has cut back on shopping at her local Torrance, California location largely because of the lot's chaos, including illegal parking along the access road that clogs traffic before shoppers even reach a spot.

In response, Costco is investing in fixes — buying adjacent land, building multi-level parking structures, and relocating cramped warehouses to roomier sites. CEO Ron Vachris told investors in May that new locations are also part of the strategy. Parking design expert David Schwegel explained the broader shift: older lots were built to squeeze in as many spots as possible, often at the cost of safe traffic flow, while newer Costcos prioritize smooth circulation with angled spaces and two-way aisles.

Why Parking Makes Us A Little Unhinged

Parking-lot rage isn't unique to Costco. Henry Grabar, author of "Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World," has documented wildly extreme reactions elsewhere — a man calling 911 over a missing spot, a Boston woman who claimed she avoided groceries entirely rather than give hers up. His read: Americans expect parking to be easy and free, and anxiety spikes the moment that expectation gets threatened, because without somewhere to park, the whole point of the trip collapses.

Neuroscientist Andrew Velkey has a theory specific to Costco: competitive parking is an extension of the "treasure hunt" mentality the store cultivates inside, triggering the same dopamine rush as a good deal. His research found that drivers chasing spots near the entrance rarely save real time compared to just parking farther out — a lesson he's taken to heart, grabbing the first open spot he sees.

So What Actually Works?

Longtime member JP Mark has strong opinions on what doesn't work — circling the lot, following shoppers to their cars, asking strangers where they parked. His actual strategy is simpler: skip the front entrance, and stake out the same reliable spot about 50 yards out at every Costco he visits. Given he shops weekly, he says the strategy's more than paid for itself.

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