Media Edge: Costco teams up with Sesame to offer medical care

Media Sales Lead: Costco partnered with Sesame, a healthcare marketplace, to provide its members with telehealth services. Sesame will provide Costco members with virtual primary care, health checkups, virtual mental health therapy, and 10% off Sesame's other services. In other news, Costco started increasing digital spend in 2021. Then, it really started ramping spend up this year, having already surpassed full-year 2022 spend. 

Key Lead Takeaways: Costco will likely continue increasing spend as it promotes its new partnership with Sesame. It may even launch an ad campaign, so get in touch now to offer ad space. 

Target Demographic: Primary shoppers (millennial & Gen-X women/moms)

Key Spend Notes:

• Media planning period: Q4
• Media buying period: Q1
• Top spending period: Q4

Digital Display & Social Media Spend Analysis & Breakdown:
**Note that Pathmatics categorizes Costco under All Categories**

2023 YTD Spend: $31m
2022 STP Spend: $17m
2022 FY Spend: $26.4m
2021 FY Spend: $21.9m

2022 Ad Flight Breakdown:

• Q1 2022 Spend: $5m
• Q2 2022 Spend: $5.5m
• Q3 2022 Spend: $6.8m
• Q4 2022 Spend: $9m

Impressions: 4.7b

Top Ad Types (by spend): Facebook (69%), Instagram (30%), and desktop display (1%). 

Top Purchase Channels: Direct (100%). 

Top Publishers: facebook.com, instagram.com, youtube.com, housebeautiful.com, and thedirty.com. 

Top Industry/Vertical Spenders: Amazon (1%), Procter & Gamble (1%), Temu (1%), PepsiCo (.7%), and Walmart (.6%). 

Top Creative (by spend; see below): Pathmatics reports that 904 creatives have run during 2023 (note that not all creatives debuted in 2023).

Other Media Spend Analysis & Breakdown

• Vivvix: Costco also utilizes print.
• Top podcasts sponsored: Stuff You Should Know, The Herd with Colin Cowherd, The Dan Bongino Show, The Joe Rogan Experience, and The Bobby Bones Show. 

Current Agency Roster:

• Deloitte Digital: digital
• In-House: media