SPECIAL SECTION: KIRKLAND SIGNATURE
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We want continuous innovation of making items better and finding a way to bring more value to the member.”
SIGNATURE celebrations
Exclusive to Costco, Kirkland Signature has been bringing value and quality to members for more than 30 years. BY DAN JONES AND NICK COZZETTO
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fficially launched more than 30 years ago, Costco’ s Kirkland Signature™ brand of products has a larger annual revenue than Nike, Campbell’ s and Hershey combined. This issue, we look at the history and philosophy behind the private label.
Costco had been calling on its suppliers to produce first-rate merchandise almost from its inception, but prior to the launch of Kirkland Signature in 1995, those items were easy to miss. Each private-label product was sold under a different name: Chelsea toilet paper, Meridian coffee and about two dozen others.
The choice to bring everything under a single banner came when Costco co-founder and former CEO Jim Sinegal visited a Costco warehouse in Los Angeles. The warehouse manager was unaware that Pinnacle brand legal tablets were a private-label – or control brand – item, so Jim decided one name for everything would be easier for both employees and members.
The Kirkland Signature name was chosen to honour Costco’ s headquarters, which were located in Kirkland, Washington, at the time. The offices were moved to nearby Issaquah the next year, but“ nobody could spell Issaquah anyway, so we just kept Kirkland”, Jim joked in a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal.
Shampoo and multivitamins were the first Kirkland Signature-labelled products to hit the warehouse shelves, with many more items to come.
“ We’ d found one name that we could really go after and merchandise with pride and buy with pride,” Costco CEO Ron Vachris says.“ It was really the momentum behind us getting going.”
Fast-forward 30 years, and Costco has more than a thousand Kirkland Signature trademarks filed worldwide. One thing has always remained consistent: the company’ s commitment to quality.
Standard of excellence
Using one name for every house-brand product category was against industry standards around the genesis of Kirkland Signature. The fear was that if a customer disliked one item, they would not consider trying anything else under the same
16 | MAR / APR 2026 COSTCO CONNECTION