The St. Albert Costco will open its doors to customers at 8 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 24, the company announced this week.
The warehouse will be the 86th Costco location in Canada, and sixth store in the Edmonton region. It will consist of a warehouse store, a gas bar and propane station and a liquor store.
Ron Damiani, spokesperson for Costco Canada, said the company is thrilled to move into the community.
“I have to say, finally we are in St. Albert. It’s a great community for us,” he said. “We know because of our membership system where our shoppers come from and there are a lot of loyal people from St. Albert that have been shopping at our other Costco locations.”
The store is part of a major development in Erin Ridge North, alongside St. Albert Trail south of Neil Ross Road. With 155,000 square feet, the store will be the largest Costco in the Edmonton region, Damiani said. The store will have more than 230 employees.
Memberships are now available at the Best Western Inn in St. Albert or at the warehouse once it opens.
Superstore workers in Alberta returned to work on Wednesday following a vote in favour of a new contract that includes pay raises and better benefits.
The vote ended a strike that began Sunday at Superstore and Liquorstore locations across the province.
Edmonton workers voted 85 per cent in favour of the deal, with 83 per cent votes cast in favour in Calgary and 91 per cent votes cast in favour in the rest of the province.
One of the main achievements of the new deal was that Loblaw would not be able to hire more lower-paid workers by cutting the work hours of existing employees, said Christine McMeckan, spokesperson for the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 401.
"We've secured language that will allow us to police this, allow us to argue that more hours are going to the workers and we are going to police this vigorously," she said.
In coming years, employees can expect wage increases and retroactive payments of up to $4. The average income of a Superstore employee is $14.50 per hour, she said.
The union also won the right to limit the amount of work that managers and outside vendors do in the stores. Outside vendors have often stocked their own products on the shelves while managers were working in aisles that should have been staffed by regular employees, she said.
As part of an upgraded benefits plan, part-time workers are now able to receive sick pay, McMeckan added, which will improve performance at the store level.
