Who’s Minding The Store ?? Food Safety at Costco Seattle University School of Law April 11 12, 2008 2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Who’s Minding The Store ??

Food Safety at CostcoSeattle University

School of LawApril 11 12, 2008

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Costco’s Quality Assurance & Food Safety

Mission Statement

“Promote continuous improvement in product quality, and food safety systems, for the benefit of our members and vendors”

“Prevention is much easier than any of the alternatives”

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Food Safety at Costco

• Food Safety Training

• Food Safety Operations

• Quality Assurance

• Food Safety Audits

• We are an item based business2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Food Safety Training• Global Cultural Approach• Costco/NEHA/NSF/ANSI Approved• 100% in house training• Costco is used as a training site for state

health inspector training in 4 states.• Provides us with a Food Safety staff of

about 140,000 employees that get it !!!• Top Down Support

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Food Safety OperationsThings to Think About

• At the Costco Warehouse:– Sanitation, SSOP'S/HACCP at Retail ???

• At the Costco Warehouse and Production Plants:– USDA, FDA, EPA, CPSC, OSHA, State, County, City =

Minimum Guidelines

• Costco Expectations---Above & Beyond• Buying = Prevention Through Specifications-• Recalls---Always protect the member !!!! Quickly

– Member Notification--Who? Why?

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Quality Assurance at Costco

• Specifications----What are they???

• Expectations

• Inspect What You Expect

• Testing--Check--Check--&--Check Again

• Share Information

• Standard of Care?

• Intervention Strategies?

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Costco Auditing Programs Code of Conduct/Social Accountability (domestic and foreign).

Food Safety (domestic and foreign).

Food Security / Bio-Security (domestic and foreign).

Animal Welfare (domestic and foreign).

Factory Evaluations—Good Manufacturing Practices/Best

Practices (domestic and foreign).

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Food Safety Audits• 5000 food safety audits a year• HACCP--every facility !! Costco Requirement• Specifications-Standards-Specifications• International Information Exchange • Standard of Care?---Raise the Standard

– test & hold – x-ray, microbial methods---testing

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

Delighting Our Members

A Costco member should always leave our building delighted with their shopping experience.

Food safety efforts should be invisible to our members!!!!

2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.

COSTCO’S CODE OF ETHICS

Obey the Law Take care of our

members Take care of our

employees Respect our vendors Reward our

shareholders2008 Costco Wholesale Corp. All Rights Reserved.