The warehouse giant’s 11-item, 16-person spread promises big portions, a modest price per plate and hours back in your holiday
Sam’s Club is betting that the most stressful meal of the year doesn’t have to be.
The Walmart-owned warehouse retailer on Thursday, Oct. 15, unveiled what it calls its largest Thanksgiving meal to date, an 11-item spread designed to feed 16 people. The bundle runs about $160, roughly $10 per guest, and the company says it can be on the table in around two hours.
Anchored by both a turkey and a ham, the package rounds out the table with two pumpkin pies and enough sides to stretch into next-day leftovers. Members can start customizing it on Oct. 28 through the Sam’s Club app or website.
Inside the Sam’s Club Thanksgiving Spread
Every item comes from the store’s Member’s Mark private label. In a press release shared with People, the company highlighted a charcuterie board meant to tide guests over before dinner, an extra main protein and a gravy recipe it says went through several rounds of refinement.
View this post on Instagram
The main event pairs a hickory smoked turkey with a boneless carver ham, served alongside Yukon Gold mashed potatoes and turkey gravy. The sides lean generous, with two orders each of green beans with dried cranberries and almonds and macaroni and cheese, plus sweet corn with garlic butter, a cranberry crunch salad and yeast dinner rolls. A charcuterie entertainment tray handles the pre-dinner snacking, and two 12-inch pumpkin pies close out the meal.
The two-protein approach means hosts don’t have to choose between turkey loyalists and ham fans. Shoppers also aren’t locked into the full lineup. Once the meal goes live, members can drop the bundle into their carts and add or remove individual items to fit their table.
Built on Member Feedback
Ashley Peoples, senior director of product development at Sam’s Club, said the goal goes beyond price. The meal is meant to hand families something just as scarce during the holidays: time together. By the company’s math, recreating the same menu from scratch would eat up seven to nine hours of the average home cook’s day.
The upgrades trace back to last year. Post-holiday surveys showed members wanted more protein, more gravy and something to nibble on before the main event. They also wanted enough food to carry into the day after Thanksgiving, which pushed the team to bulk up the side dishes.
Sam’s Club didn’t develop the menu in a vacuum. Between 20 and 30 employees sampled rival retailers’ holiday meals to see how the competition stacked up. Designers also kept real-world kitchens in mind, building the meal around a standard setup of a single oven with two racks.
The Gravy That Took Four Tries
No component demanded more attention than the gravy. The team cycled through four rounds of testing before landing on the right mix of ingredients and consistency.
In June, roughly 100 members gathered in Dallas for a taste test staged in a room fully dressed for the holidays, despite the summer calendar. The team knew it had a winner when testers started likening the gravy to the kind their grandmothers used to make.
Aldi Throws Down a Budget Challenge
Sam’s Club isn’t the only chain chasing holiday shoppers early. Aldi announced on Oct. 14 a classic Thanksgiving meal for 10 people priced under $39. That works out to less than $4 per person, though hosts will need to put in the kitchen hours themselves.
The discount grocer’s version is more of a cook-it-yourself kit. It includes a 16-pound turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, cranberries, peas, carrots, celery, dinner rolls and whipping cream, plus the makings for pumpkin pie: pie mix, heavy whipping cream, whole milk and pie crusts.
The two offers reflect different bets on what holiday hosts value most. Aldi leans into rock-bottom pricing for those willing to do the cooking, while Sam’s Club is selling convenience, variety and a lighter load in the kitchen for larger gatherings.
With food costs still weighing on many households, the fight for Thanksgiving dollars is already in full swing, more than a month before the holiday arrives. For hosts staring down a crowded table, that competition could mean fewer hours over the stove and more money left in their wallets.
