Lowe’s sells a 16 pack of Duracell AA batteries for $9.97.

Costco sells the same 16 pack for $8.49. The Target 16 pack costs $10.39.

If I am in a different store, Costco doesn’t make it easy for me to figure out whether I should buy right away or hold off until the weekly Costco run. While Costco does have a website, not all items sold in the warehouse appear on the website.

Absolutely horrible photo. Couldn’t get a close-up and the phone focused on the box instead. Anyways, the 16 pack of AA batteries sells for $8.49 and the 16 pack of AAA sells for $11.39. No way I could finish a 16 pack of AAA in one year. However, the pack I bought from OSH is good until 2015, which is six years away.

I needed some AAA batteries and picked up an 8 pack at OSH.

I really don’t have too many devices that require AAA batteries, so I wasn’t going to buy that jumbo pack from Costco, even though on a per battery basis, it would likely have been much cheaper. If I bought a 4 pack, the per battery price was $0.985. For the 8 pack, the per battery price was $0.795. Since Costco had trained me to buy in bulk, I took a look at the 16 pack price.

At OSH, the 16 pack of AAA batteries cost $0.81 per battery—slightly more than the 8 pack price! I don’t have a AAA battery comparison at a different store, but I do have a AA battery comparison at Target.

Target sells a 16 pack of AA batteries for $10.39. OSH sells the same for $12.95—24.64% more than the Target price.