KSHB 41 reporter Charlie Keegan covers politics in Kansas, Missouri and at the local level. Share your story idea with Charlie.
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City council members in Kansas City, Missouri, passed a resolution Thursday with the intent of keeping the Midtown Costco from transitioning to a business center.
An employee told Councilwoman Melissa Patterson Hazley about the possibility of the format change. The potential change has garnered attention from several customers and neighborhood associations who threw their support behind Thursday’s resolution.
“I just personally got a lot of reach-outs about it,” said Patterson Hazley, a weekly shopper at the store.
Costco business centers are focused on serving business owners. There are no cafés, bakeries, pharmacies, eye centers, and other amenities customers are used to seeing at standard wholesale stores.
About 60 percent of the items in a Costco business center are unique to that format.
The closest business center to Kansas City is in St. Louis.
“Costco, please don’t change this Linwood location, we need you,” shopper Marleka Morris said.
“If you wanted to go to another Costco that is like this, it might mean having to drive an extra 20 minutes or so,” shopper Doug Schranck added.
The resolution the city council passed authorizes the city manager and economic development team to negotiate with Costco to keep the store the same or add more benefits to residents. It does not detail what those negotiations could include.
“Part of the [city manager] job is business retention and business attraction,” Patterson Hazley said. “It is completely appropriate for them to have those kinds of conversations with corporations that are in Kansas City,
Sales tax generated at stores like Costco generate large amounts of money for cities. Some business-to-business sales under a Costco business center would be tax-exempt.
A Costco spokesperson said the company doesn’t comment on future plans until there are details to share.
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