My Saturdays often start in the same riveting fashion: breakfast, a long dog walk and a requisite trip to an East Bay farmers market to feel like the native Californian I am. I come back with a few pears, a malasada and a 12-ounce coffee and wonder where my $20 went.

Then, it’s time for actual grocery shopping, which, in this age of ever-increasing prices, means hitting multiple stores for the best deals. At Safeway, I clip digital coupons for avocados. At Target, I grab my son’s Vitamin Water, which is about $3 less per case than it is at Safeway. Then, once a month, I make the inevitable trip to Costco for bulk-buying. I brave the congested parking lot and put my $65 annual membership to work on olive oil, canned tuna and more apples than we need. I even buy the infamous rotisserie chicken, despite how salty and slimy it is these days. 

But when I recently ran across a deeply discounted membership for another big-box grocery store in the Bay Area — Sam’s Club, which has some of the same benefits, often for less and with fewer restrictions — I decided to cheat on my old Saturday faithful.

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While there are only two Sam’s Club stores in the Bay Area, in Concord and Vacaville, the Walmart Inc. division that’s worth $90 billion is growing its 30-store footprint in California with two more locations this year in Lathrop and Visalia. It keeps improving on its nifty Scan & Go tech within the mobile app, which allows customers to bypass checkout lines entirely. Sam’s Club also accepts all major credit cards, not just Visa, which is the only plastic that Costco takes in-store. 

The entrance to the Sam’s Club store in Concord, Calif., leads to Member Services.

The interior of the Sam’s Club store in Concord, Calif. 

People seem to like the convenience: For two consecutive years, Sam’s Club has beat Costco as the warehouse retailer with the highest satisfaction rate. After I found that deal cutting the $50 annual Sam’s Club membership (already $15 cheaper than Costco’s basic tier) to a mere 15 bucks, I hightailed it to the Concord location, which is just over 2 miles away from a Costco store.

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Don't let Google decide who you trust.

Almost immediately, I noticed a difference between the two warehouses. Sam’s Club was quieter — both in........

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