Price Comparison

It is not easy to compare the pricing  because they all do it differently.  In addition, they have one system of charging customers when you leave your goods in a cart at Costco/Sam's, and another when you send in an order.  I think that you generally get a better deal when you shop yourself and fill out the paperwork and leave it all at the store for them to pick up and ship.

Without further ado...

And here is a nifty graph I made in excel showing the differing cost of various items ordered through these firms.  Lavender is the price in the store (Costco or Sam's), and red is the price of buying and shipping it yourself.  Blue is JB Bush.

Here is a spreadsheet trying to show what each company charges.  Note that there can be several different ways they charge, depending on how you place the order and with whom.

*The prices of items on Express Yourself's website are generally higher than the actual prices at Costco/Sam's, meaning if you order through the web you are paying a bigger "fee" than you might realize.

**With ABS, buying it yourself or faxing your large order directly to Costco for purchase ensures you pay the service fee based on actual cost of items purchased.  Ordering through the ABS catalog will inflate the cost significantly based on higher prices in catalog than they actually are at Costco, or at least that was the case the last time I checked.  I was not able to get a current catalog as they are not accepting new customers at this time due to a continual 2-3 week backlog of orders.

Mailbox Groceries and Span Alaska both offer websites and printed catalogs of their goods, which are housed in their private warehouses. It is not possible to determine their fee structure. The pricing listed includes delivery to your village and all fees, except for Mailbox Groceries, which adds a small fuel surcharge. People like that it is not complicated, and they can pick exactly what they want.  As you can see from the rankings at the top of this page, this convenience has a price.

Here is the actual data I used.  Blanks indicate they didn't have that product listed.

I have now spent most of my free time for several days working on this project, but I think I'm glad at this point because it makes me more sure what I had come to suspect.  JB Bush is the way to go.  Alaska Bush Service came closer than I thought they would, but if you used their catalog pricing it would push them much farther back.  And they aren't taking new customers and even if they were they have a 2 to 3 week backlog of orders.  JB Bush!  JB Bush!  J  Their phone # in Anchorage is 800-478-7234 or 243-7233, and the fax # is 243-5744.  They don't have a website.  Hey, no frills!  But you can order via email to jbbush@gci.net.

I hope this was informative for you.  Feel free to email me with specific comments or questions, I know it is very confusing.  And here is the excel file I used for all of this stuff if you want to check my formulas or whatever. 

Disclaimers:  I have no axe to grind, I don't work for or against any of these companies.  The rankings and graph above are based on a 10-item sample taken in August 2007 using actual Costco and Sam's Club receipts from June and July 2007, as well as the Mailbox Groceries June catalog, and the Span Alaska catalog received in late July or early August by mail.  Express Yourself item prices were pulled from their website on August 14 & 15.  Any statistical analyst will tell you that a 10 item sample is far too small to make any broad conclusions.  If a baseball players gets 5 home runs in 10 at bats, it doesn't mean he will hit 300 home runs in 600 at bats over the course of a season.  These 10 items were randomly selected, and the results do fall in line with my expectations based on my experience shopping from the bush for over four years.