BJ's Wholesale Club — Restaurant in Gainesville

To put it in simplest terms, BJ’s wholesale club is “lackluster”. I will say up front, this store deserves credit for being clean and having a friendly staff. Nonetheless, there are many things about this store that make it more of a “wholesale club lite” than a major one like Costco. My biggest complaint is the coupon methodology. As a former Sam’s Club user, I don’t ever recall needing to bring coupons. With BJ’s, about every other week, they send you a book of coupons in the mail. Before you go to the store, you then have to look through this book and separate out the coupons for the products you’re going to purchase; a huge hassle to get discounts on products that should be competitively priced automatically, considering you’re paying for a membership. Aside from coupons, I feel that BJ’s selection of products is significantly weaker than that of other wholesale clubs. Very often I find myself going to this club and coming home with several items not crossed off my shopping list. This isn’t even because a product is out of stock (although that happens occasionally); it’s just simply because they don’t carry it. And this applies to BJ’s in general. This particular location of BJ’s is even worse because it’s one of their smaller locations, so their selection of products is smaller too (i.e. they don’t offer clothes, tires, or even Aquafina® here). Overall, BJ’s really only satisfies basic needs, and if you are one who thrives off of wholesale, BJ’s won’t make the cut. That being said, I feel that it should only be used as a backup if you are trying to avoid the crowds of the Manassas Costco and don’t want to make the trip to Dulles for Sam’s. (Update: this location now offers clothes, but it's mostly women's clothes and they discontinued the sale of DVDs to do so, so it's basically just substituting one unavailability...

It is quite unfortunate that this rating does not allow for a zero because that is rating this establishment so deserves. They do not have adequate staff and thus have issues with assisting their members. The few staff that were helpful seemed to have vanished without a trace. The club manager is utterly delightful in the sense that he cannot and does not seem to be able to function without passing members around like they are some sort of dodge ball. I cannot stress enough that this place needs some serious sort of aid from somewhere. Do not get me started on the assistant club manager either. He does not seem to respect personal space nor a sense of smell considering the copious amounts of cologne that he seems to enjoy dousing himself in. The amount of times I walk in and have someone always asking me if I would perhaps be interested in applying for their so called beneficial credit card churns the insides of my stomach. How do these individuals sleep at night knowing that they have disturbed the peace of a member who would just like to shop without the annoyance of a piece of plastic being shoved into their very being when they would just like to shop and go home. I assume that their corporate does not care about their members or else they would not ask you any time you get something done to...

Update- now a two star for Corporate. I learned that BJs corporate keeps changing their mitiary benefits. Managers and a few other employees work the military program. I'm satisfied with my results. Another the terrible review of this store. One star. When will someone pay attention? My warning is to all active duty and retired military personnel currently using or thinking about using this location.... you'd better ask in advance if the code for renewing a military membership is available. As of today it's not. You can't renew your membership on-line or by phone, because they want to see your ID card. Okay. So today I went to this store, my usual BJ'S and attempt to renew my military membership. I couldn't. No one at the store had access to the code to renew my membership. Apparently it was someone's bright idea to have only one person on the entire staff to have access to that code. Apparently not even the on dutyanager. I have to go back, a 30 mile round trip, when this person is at work! What! Another example of the terrible customer service...