Costco, Sam's Club or BJ's: Which is the best store?

Costco, Sam's Club, and BJ's Wholesale are membership-based warehouse stores selling groceries, clothing, furniture, and, well, lots of other stuff.

All three stores offer eye and ear exams, a pharmacy, one-hour photo services, and either a food court or kiosk at affordable prices. Even the return policies are similar, though BJ's stops accepting items after a year, while Costco and Sam's Club will do so for most items at any time.

After visiting all three stores, I found that aside from the cost of membership, Costco and Sam's Club were very similar, while BJ's seemed as if it was struggling to catch up.

Costco's yearly membership is $60, while BJ's comes in second at $55 and Sam's Club is the least expensive at $45. The annual cost of premium memberships ranked similarly, with Costco costing $120, BJ's $110, and Sam's Club $100.

According to a grocery-store ranking from Consumer Reports, the higher membership costs at Costco might be worth it - it ranked higher than Sam's Club and BJ's in cleanliness, meat and produce quality, customer service, store-brand quality, and prices of organic items.

BJ's ranked higher than Sam's Club in just two categories: healthy organic options and checkout speed.

To see for myself which store offered the best deal, I went to a BJ's Wholesale in Jersey City, New Jersey, and Costco and Sam's Club stores in Westchester County, New York. Here's what I found.

(Click ahead)