Costco’s food court is getting a new item, and Arizona shoppers won’t have to wait forever to see it here. The warehouse chain has started selling five-piece breaded chicken breast strips with a dipping sauce at select locations in Illinois for $6.99.
The new tenders have already gotten plenty of attention online. A May 5 TikTok showing them at a Costco in the Chicago suburbs drew more than 364,000 views, with commenters zeroing in on the size of the meal. According to the reporting, the five-piece order comes in at 1,640 calories. For comparison, five chicken fingers at Raising Cane’s come out to 650 calories.
That’s the national story in a nutshell: Costco is testing a new food court item in limited U.S. locations, and the reaction has been loud. The tenders are not widely available in the U.S. yet, though they were introduced in Canadian warehouses in 2023 and Australian locations in 2024, according to TastingTable.
For Arizona, the key detail is simple. Employees at multiple Costco locations in the state said the chicken tenders were not yet available at food courts here, but that the meal would be coming within the next few months. Costco did not respond to a request for comment.
So if you’re a Valley Costco regular, this is one to keep on the radar. The state has 20 Costco locations, including stores in Phoenix, Mesa, Scottsdale, Tempe, Chandler, Gilbert, Glendale, Surprise, Buckeye, Avondale, Queen Creek, Prescott and Tucson. That doesn’t mean every location will flip the switch at the same time, but it does mean there are plenty of places where the new item could show up once the rollout reaches Arizona.
For now, the tenders are still a wait-and-see item here. But in Costco terms, that usually means the line is already forming.
