Costco - Now providing 350kw DC Charging Stations

[Freeewilly]

Probably have to factor in the cost of these EA charging station. Google says each EA charger costs from $122,000 to $440,000 in CA.
For comparison, Tesla Supercharger v4 stall costs $40,000 to $45,000

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[Gino]

How is the market-clearing price for DCFC either "price gouging" or "ridiculous"?
(Sure that Costco station might be seeing little use now, but once those poorly thought-out EA freebie plans end, I suspect that will change.)

64 cents/kwh is equivalent to over $6 gas and commercial customers are typically charged between 5 & 10 cents/kwh in California so they are marketing their charging services at 25-30% higher than the equivalent price for gas.
This would be no different than a gas station selling regular gas at $6 to $7 per gallon when the average from other stations was in the $4 to $5 range. Of course the only ICE drivers to pay 25-30% more for gas would be either an emergency to get a few gallons of gas to get to a cheaper station or a driver who doesn’t care if they pay $4 or $7 a gallon because someone else is picking up the tab for their gas.
It shows people (like me) who charged at EA stations when it was included in the free charging period but completely stop using EA once you have a choice between ridiculous pricing at 64 cents/kWh vs numerous other options as low as 38 cents after hours or 48 cents in prime time using the Tesla network.
They can charge whatever they want but ultimately smart EV owners won’t pay these ridiculous prices.

 

[Gino]

Probably have to factor in the cost of these EA charging station. Google says each EA charger costs from $122,000 to $440,000 in CA.
For comparison, Tesla Supercharger v4 stall costs $40,000 to $45,000

It really doesn’t matter what the EA charger costs. If they price their service at 64 cents per kWh they won’t get enough takers to do enough business to recover their costs. I’m assuming they are testing the market and will eventually start dropping their charging rate. If they don’t get enough customers to pay their high price then they aren’t paying back their investment fast enough. It costs me 23 cents per kWh from 9pm to 4pm and 61 cents per kWh from 4pm to 9pm.
The only time I would ever use these EA chargers would be if I needed to charge very fast with DC charging from 4pm to 9pm which I could easily avoid.

 

[Mr.Smith]

Base on EA app, Costco is charging $0.64/kWh at this location, it costs higher than other EA stations in the area.

The closest charger to Chino is in Diamond Bar. That location has 4 stations, always full, with lines up to 8 cars waiting from 6am to 2am.
People will pay a litte more for a topper, just to get home

 

[Jonathan S.]

This would be no different than a gas station selling regular gas at $6 to $7 per gallon when the average from other stations was in the $4 to $5 range.

Sure sounds completely different to me: since when are various energy sources (e.g., refined petroleum for ICE vs DCFC for EV) always priced so as to achieve perfect equivalency for any given energy user?

They can charge whatever they want but ultimately smart EV owners won’t pay these ridiculous prices.

Will be interesting to see where prices eventually settle at for large reliable DCFC stations.
And whether time-of-use / congestion pricing will become more common.

The 32-charger TSCN station I visited on Friday a little past noon was very busy at $0.50/kWh (at least for me, with no pass or anything). Still several available chargers. But had it been, say, even a 12-charger station, would have had long lines, even at $0.50/kWh.

Personally, I'd rather pay several cents more per kWh (even more like a dollar) for reliability and lack of wait time.

 

[Freeewilly]

It's kind of a disappointment especially from Costco. Their business model is provide quality, value and low markup.
Maybe it's a good thing to stay away from Costco, whenever I did a quick stop at Costco with my wife, I easily spend few hundred dollars for unnecessity items

 

[Gino]

The closest charger to Chino is in Diamond Bar. That location has 4 stations, always full, with lines up to 8 cars waiting from 6am to 2am.
People will pay a litte more for a topper, just to get home

Always full with people using passes & free charging. You are correct some people will top off occasionally but it is likely that won’t be enough business to recover their costs fast enough. They will try but in the end with other choices at lower rates their chargers will remain mostly empty.
I don’t blame them for trying to recover their investment as quickly as possible but I would bet they would begin accepting passes & free charging contracts soon if usage doesn’t pick up enough. At least if they start accepting the free charging contracts they will be swamped like the other local EA stations. I don’t feel sorry for them.

 

[Gino]

Sure sounds completely different to me: since when are various energy sources (e.g., refined petroleum for ICE vs DCFC for EV) always priced so as to achieve perfect equivalency for any given energy user?


Will be interesting to see where prices eventually settle at for large reliable DCFC stations.
And whether time-of-use / congestion pricing will become more common.

The 32-charger TSCN station I visited on Friday a little past noon was very busy at $0.50/kWh (at least for me, with no pass or anything). Still several available chargers. But had it been, say, even a 12-charger station, would have had long lines, even at $0.50/kWh.

Personally, I'd rather pay several cents more per kWh (even more like a dollar) for reliability and lack of wait time.

It’s pretty standard to price energy equivalent to other energy sources.
Back in New England the price for home heating oil, natural gas, propane & cord wood are all competing based on the equivalent BTU output for each energy source to heat a home.
It’s natural to do this when it comes to motor vehicles/EVs. Of course there are expensive gas stations which get customers to top off out of convenience but there needs to be enough demand at the higher price to achieve their revenue goals. Each business must decide if they want to earn more profit/day by dropping their prices to stimulate higher volume but some businesses will try to squeeze out the highest margins with the fewest customers and be fine with significantly less utilization of their chargers. The only time I’ve ever paid a premium for gas is when I was young and didn’t watch my gas level. I would put a few gallons of expensive gas in to get to a reasonably priced gas station but I would never fill up at a high priced station. I hate paying more than I have to for anything but some people don’t care and are not concerned about paying less. Usually these people don’t care because saving money is not a priority. They either aren’t paying for anything or they make so much money they don’t even consider the price difference for a kWh, gallon of gas or gallon of milk. That‘s great for those who’ve always had more money than they would ever need.
I was always price conscious when I was in college and afterwards but even now when these savings are not as significant I still pride myself in taking simple steps to efficiently use the dollars I earn to not just give them away to businesses which overprice their goods & services. I prefer to reward businesses which deliver better prices.

 

[Gino]

It's kind of a disappointment especially from Costco. Their business model is provide quality, value and low markup.
Maybe it's a good thing to stay away from Costco, whenever I did a quick stop at Costco with my wife, I easily spend few hundred dollars for unnecessity items

I’m a bit surprised as well but maybe they are just testing the market so they can determine the best pricing to balance prices vs demand.
If they accept the free charging customers then they are likely getting the lowest kWh charges from these contracts which has a longer payback period (ROI) but they also have increased maintenance & operation costs if their chargers are being dominated with free charging and not enough 64cents/kw customers.

 

[Jonathan S.]

^ Yes, of course energy prices are all linked to some extent. But that doesn't lead to exact equivalency in pricing for all consumers. Just like what I pay for propane heating at my house isn't the same as what nearby houses pay for natural gas. If DCFC was, say, ten times the equivalent cost of ICE, then EV roadtripping wouldn't be much of a thing. But if reliable DCFC ends up being the 25-30% figure you cite for being more expensive than ICE, then although that certainly will put a damper on EV adoption, then doesn't mean it's "price gouging" or "ridiculous" if that's what it takes for companies to be willing to build and operate large DCFC stations on their own dime.

 

[Tooney]

It's kind of a disappointment especially from Costco. Their business model is provide quality, value and low markup.
Maybe it's a good thing to stay away from Costco, whenever I did a quick stop at Costco with my wife, I easily spend few hundred dollars for unnecessity items

Yes, if Costco can't get your bill at checkout up to $200, that store failed.
Costco sets its EV charger prices, not EA, per Grok

 

[Gino]

^ Yes, of course energy prices are all linked to some extent. But that doesn't lead to exact equivalency in pricing for all consumers. Just like what I pay for propane heating at my house isn't the same as what nearby houses pay for natural gas. If DCFC was, say, ten times the equivalent cost of ICE, then EV roadtripping wouldn't be much of a thing. But if reliable DCFC ends up being the 25-30% figure you cite for being more expensive than ICE, then although that certainly will put a damper on EV adoption, then doesn't mean it's "price gouging" or "ridiculous" if that's what it takes for companies to be willing to build and operate large DCFC stations on their own dime.

It’s ridiculous if you care about the price you pay for the unit’s you get.
When I go by a gas station in Southern California with regular gas at $5.75/gallon I and many others would say that price is ridiculous when I can go to Costco and pay $3.75 a gallon which is the “good deal” standard near me.
The gas station selling at $5.75 is not ridiculous since he/she is consciously increasing his price, knowingly lowering the demand for his product. He makes a bigger margin for the exact same product but offers no waiting to people willing to pay the premium.
It’s as simple as that. Price conscious consumers won’t pay $5.75 but the smaller group of price insensitive consumers will not care what the cost is. You have to do big volume to fully utilize a charger 24/7 which is why many of the smart operators have TOU charging rates including EA in many locations.
Charging 64 cents/kw 24 hours a day is an inefficient and poor decision to maximize profits just as charging 35 cents /kw 24 hours a day would be giving away profits during peak demand hours. This is why smart operators around the country drop their prices significantly between midnight & 6am and charge the most from 6am to 6pm.
This is what every operator eventually does since keeping their price a 64 cents long term will be a bad business decision since they aren’t maximizing profits.
Also many gas stations make more money on their convenience store sales than the margins they make on gas.

 

[Jonathan S.]

It’s as simple as that.

For the same commodity indistinguishable by any qualities (except for, say, restrooms), sure.
But no, a $2 differential for gas that would indeed be "ridiculous" (as well as infeasible) is not the same as a $2 differential equivalent for ICE vs EV DCFC.

 

[Tooney]

The only time I use DCFC is when I am roadtripping.
Happy to see Costco (and Walmart) rolling out more EV fast charging sites.
More reliable EV fast charging sites being available along a road trip route is much more important than price.

 

[Flying ace]

Given the cost, I would expect Costco to move to a member pricing soon, and likely TOU, which makes more sense in the long run for 350kw units.

BP Pulse launched their Gighubs with TOU, and they've started adjusting TOU rates locally to more "less gouging" pricing. I'm almost certain this is bc they are simply not seeing the volume. For BP Pulse to do this is very telling that demand drops at $0.50/kwh, and Gighubs has no other material revenue source other then charging.

Costco's (and Walmart's) selection of 350kw/400kw units is interesting. This indicates they are in the business of providing DCFC for solely this purpose and to leverage membership benefits for discounts.

Otherwise if they wanted to incentivize store traffic, they're better off installing 50kw units. I ran into this issue in my road trip last winter. Charged to 99% at a Costco EA site bc we made a stop for restrooms and snack break, and I had to rush outside to unplug as to not incur idle fees.

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