Costco Wholesale Corporation Announces Quarterly Cash Dividend

ISSAQUAH, WA--(Marketwire - Jan 26, 2012) - Costco Wholesale Corporation ("Costco" or the "Company") (NASDAQ: COST) today announced that its Board of Directors declared a quarterly cash dividend on Costco Wholesale common stock. The dividend of $.24 per share is payable February 24, 2012, to shareholders of record at the close of business on February 10, 2012.

Costco currently operates 598 warehouses, including 433 in the United States and Puerto Rico, 82 in Canada, 32 in Mexico, 22 in the United Kingdom, 11 in Japan, eight in Taiwan, seven in Korea and three in Australia. The Company also operates Costco Online, an electronic commerce web site, at www.costco.com and at www.costco.ca in Canada. The Company plans to open up to an additional twelve new warehouses (including the relocation of a warehouse to a larger and a better-located facility) prior to the end of its fifty-three-week fiscal year on September 2, 2012.

Certain statements contained in this document constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. For these purposes, forward-looking statements are statements that address activities, events, conditions or developments that the Company expects or anticipates may occur in the future. Such forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that may cause actual events, results or performance to differ materially from those indicated by such statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, domestic and international economic conditions, including exchange rates, the effects of competition and regulation, uncertainties in the financial markets, consumer and small business spending patterns and debt levels, conditions affecting the acquisition, development, ownership or use of real estate, actions of vendors, rising costs associated with employees (including health care costs), energy, and certain commodities, geopolitical conditions and other risks identified from time to time in the Company's public statements and reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.