Background
Costco is a great place to shop, you can get your necessities in huge quantities at rock bottom pricing. For items that are commodities such as baby wipes, toilet paper and chicken, Costco is truly the best bang for your buck and I would highly recommend it.
Where Costco fails miserably is when they show you huge savings on an item that is supposed to be high quality. I say “supposed to” because Costco will take companies that typically have had great quality products and force them to strip out all of the things that made it great to reach a price point they deem favorable for the customer. In reality, they are completely screwing over the customer and I feel horrible for the people who got taken for a ride believing they were getting the same quality product. The best example of this is Cannon Safe Company, Rhino and Vaultek. Cannon used to be one of the highest quality producers of Gun Safes in the country, but once they started selling to companies like Walmart and Costco, everything went down hill. Rhino makes a specific brand called Bighorn that is exclusively sold at Costco and a much lower quality version than their Made in USA products. Vaultek took their popular biometric handgun safes and stripped down to the thinnest steel possible in the Barikade series. I can go on and on with example after example of a company that uses their brand name to sell you an inferior product at Costco. It’s just sad.
How are Safes Different at Costco?
There are some main components to gun safes that are what we call “behind the curtain” that are vitally essential to the long-term use and security of the safe. HOWEVER, you don’t see them from the front of the safe, you only see them behind the back panel.
- On the front of the safe, you see the lock, the handle, the paint job and a placard that tells you the security rating (if there is one), the fire rating (if there is one) and the storage capacity.
- What you don’t see is all of the actual meat and potatoes, you get disillusioned by the gravy! On a real safe, you have things like a hardplate , a relocker , thicker steel in the door and body , longer bolts, high quality fire material and strong locking mechanisms operating the boltwork.
With a safe from Costco, you get the thinnest steel possible in all areas of the safe, no relocker, no hardplate, little to no boltwork and an untested fire rating.
So while the safe may look big and robust from the outside, it can be popped or cut open in under 5 minutes with basic tools like a hand saw or a crowbar.
Another major disadvantage to a Costco safe is the lock. More often than not you’ll find every safe at Costco having a key override behind the lock that will allow access in the event the electronics die. Unfortunately, any safe that has a key override automatically disqualifies for any type of insurance rating and the reason why they put the key in the first place is that they know the electronics will die. It’s not an “if” they will die but a “when” they will die situation. Key locks are ridiculously easy to pick as can be seen on tons of different youtube videos and ruins any security you think you had. I highly, highly suggest you make sure the safe you purchase has a UL Rated Lock preferably made in the US or Europe. My favorite electronic locks are made by NL, S&G and Securam. NL has a very affordable option in the NL Universal Lock UR-2020 and a Redundant option that features both a mechanical dial in the middle and electronics on top meaning you’ll never get locked out of your safe and you don’t need a key override. Here is a great video by Dean’s Safe explaining the benefits and features of the Redundant Lock: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CC1c2xN8DI4
Conclusion
When it comes to buying a good quality safe that offers more than 5 minutes of protection, I would highly advise you stay away from anything sold at Costco, Walmart, Sam’s Club, Tractor Supply or Dick’s Sporting Goods. The one big box store actually selling a quality products is Cabela’s with their Pro Series made by Liberty Safe. I highly recommend looking at safes from American Security, Fort Knox, Liberty, Rhino and Stealth. All of these companies have an excellent reputation, great warranties and reliable products.
Check out this list of good quality Gun Safes with Free shipping from Amazon
The only good quality safes that I’ve been able find at prices that compete with Costco are the Stealth Essential Gun Safes. They provide all of the essential security features Costco has ripped out of their safes for a similar or lower cost. You can check them out on Amazon by clicking the links below:
Stealth Essential Gun Safe EGS14
Stealth Essential Gun Safe EGS23
Stealth Essential Gun Safe EGS28
