Pepsi To Replace Coke In Costco’s Beloved $1.50 Soda & Hot Dog Deal

For many Costco shoppers, a trip to the warehouse store isn’t complete without stopping by the lunch counter and plunking down $1.50 for a hot dog and a Coca-Cola beverage. It’s the same price and pairing the company has had since 1985. But that’s about to change, with Costco making the decision to switch all its stores over to Pepsi.

“It’s a big shift,” Costco’s VP for food services confirmed to BevNet.com [via SeattlePI]. “They’re the only vendor we’ve ever had for the majority of the business locations.”

In some regions, Costco has already made the switch, but this announcement means that shoppers at all 400-something stores will soon be asked “Is Pepsi okay?” when they cozy up to the counter for their shop-time snack.

“You’re not going to be able to please everybody,” explained the store executive, who says that Costco food courts sell 100 million hot dogs each year. “It’s our job to preserve the integrity of the price point.”

The Costco VP says the change has nothing to do with the 2009 standoff between Costco and Coke, where a pricing dispute resulted in the store refusing to stock the beverage company’s products for a few months.

As BevNet points out, this could be a huge coup for Pepsi, which never seems to be able to catch up to Coca-Cola’s market dominance. Even if the company makes little to no profit on the deal, it will be putting 31 million more gallons of its beverages in the hands of consumers each year.

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