®
PUBLISHER Ginnie Roeglin
EDITOR David W. Fuller 425-313-8510 dfuller@costco.com
EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Anita Thompson 425-313-6442
athompson@costco.com
MANAGING EDITOR MANAGING EDITOR
MAGAZINES BOOKS
T. Foster Jones 425-313-6748 Tim Talevich 425-313-6759
Tod.Jones@costco.com
ttalevich@costco.com
ONLINE EDITOR
David Wight David. Wight@costco.com
ASSOCIATE EDITORS
Lorelle Gilpin, Ottawa 613-221-2009 Lorelle.Gilpin@costco.com
Sue Knowles, London 011-44-1923-213113 sknowles@costco.co.uk
Raymond Kyunghwan Kim, Seoul 82-2-2630-2703 khkim@costcokr.com
ASSISTANT EDITORS
Stephanie E. Ponder, Seattle sponder@costco.com
Jessica Jihye Han, Seoul
jhhan@costcokr.com
REPORTERS
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Steve Fisher Steve. Fisher@costco.com
COPY EDITOR Miriam Bulmer
CONTRIBUTORS
Mark E. Battersby, Nanette Blanchard,
Paul and Sarah Edwards, Susan Hirshorn, David Horowitz,
Allison Ehri Kreitler, Suze Orman, Paula Reed, J. Rentilly,
Dorman T. Shindler, Pat Volchok
ART DIRECTOR Doris Winters dwinters@costco.com
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The Costco Connection is published by Costco Wholesale. All
editorial material, including editorial comments, opinion and statements of fact appearing in this publication, represents the views of
the respective authors and does not necessarily carry the endorsement of Costco Wholesale or its officers. Information in The Costco
Connection is gathered from sources considered to be reliable, but
the accuracy of all information cannot be guaranteed. The publication of any advertisements is not to be construed as an endorsement of the product or service offered unless it is specifically stated
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WA 98027. Copyright © 2009 Costco Wholesale.
FRONTend
from the publisher’s desk
Ginnie Roeglin
IT’S HARD TO BELIEVE that summer is almost
over. I hope that the season of sun brought you special
moments with family and friends.
Every season is special at Costco, and we’ve already
been planning new and exciting ways to bring value
and quality into your home in the coming days of fall.
For instance, many people are trying to cut costs
in regard to dining. In our special “For Your Home”
section, on page 29, we offer some tips on how you
can duplicate the dining-out experience in your home
with a variety of essential small appliances. On page 31,
you’ll find information on how to choose the best
heater for the cold months ahead. And your holidays will be much brighter with
the new LED lights available, described on page 33.
Costco is also working hard to make it affordable to dine out and travel if the
mood strikes, with a variety of discounts for restaurants, Broadway shows, sports
events, Disney theme park packages and more, available through our warehouse
programs and on Costco.com You’ll find out more from Pat Volchok in her “Buying
Smart” article on page 56.
Something else we’re excited about is our new electronics recycling program,
offered through Costco.com and Gazelle, a leader in the industry. Through a very
simple process, described on page 53, you can ship your old and outdated electronics,
including iPods, laptops, cellphones, digital cameras, LCD monitors, video games,
GPS devices and a host of other items—in most cases at no charge—in exchange for a
Costco Cash card.
Whether you choose to take advantage of one of Costco’s event ticket programs
and hit the town, or stay in, create your own masterpiece meal and snuggle up in the
cozy warmth of your home, remember that Costco is here for you, every season and
every day. C
Ginnie Roeglin is Senior Vice
President, E-Commerce and
Publishing, and Publisher of
The Costco Connection.
from the editor’s desk
David W. Fuller
EMPLOYEES AT COSTCO are encouraged to strive
for excellence, not perfection. Excellence is an achievable
goal of high-quality performance; perfection generally is
an unachievable goal that can lead to disappointment,
even neurosis.
But where is the line between striving for excellence
and striving for perfection?
For The Costco Connection, excellence is a matter
of attempting to be fair-minded in all of our coverage,
balanced in our presentation of the subjects we cover, and
assiduous in our fact-gathering and fact-checking.
Perfection in these matters would mean never choosing an inept word in our stories
and headlines, never misrepresenting a comment by an interviewee or source, never
missing something in a photo that we should have seen.
I bring this up because a trusted adviser recently asked me (after an unusual spate of
missteps you can read about in this month’s Dialogue, page 8) if it was my expectation that
we could ever achieve perfection in an issue. My answer was that I did not think perfection
was possible, but our failure to consistently achieve excellence is always disappointing.
The impossibility of achieving perfection does not mean we can discount the errors
that we make. However, the absolute achievement of excellence and integrity The
Connection strives for means that when we do make a mistake, whether it is one of
omission or commission, we acknowledge it, learn from it and constantly improve our
systems and our discipline so that we reduce the number of errors—even if it’s not
to zero. C
David W. Fuller is Assistant
Vice President, Publishing, and
Editor of The Costco Connection.
