Costco shoppers are flocking to the shelves for the Aussie snack that has finally made its way into American stores.
“Australian Oreo” sparks a frenzy at Costco. Tim Tams, the iconic Australian cookie, are being stocked at Costco across the US and American shoppers have been stocking up.
The Original Tim Tam is a three-layered treat: two boiled chocolate biscuits with a creamy cocoa filling, all covered in a thin layer of chocolate fudge. Although the classic is the gold standard, it also offers varieties such as White Chocolate, Mango and Cream and Chocolate Mint.
For $13.99 a box, you get six sleeves — 66 cookies in all — but even that’s not enough for the ravenous Costco crowds. Customers load their carts with dozens of boxes, causing chaos to take over the aisles.
The love of Tim Tams is not just taste, but culture. American customers quickly learned the art of the “Tim Tam Slam.” As one Reddit user exclaimed: “My Australian friend said drink your coffee with it like a straw.”
A “Slam” is where you bite off the diagonal corners, dip one end into your hot drink, and sip the liquid through the cookie like a straw. If hot coffee or tea melts the inner cream, then eat the cookie before it melts.
In Australia, where they were created by Arnott in 1964, cookies are a national treasure. They are imported from Sydney and are known as “Slam.”
The cookies sold in the US are popular and still not the same recipe as the AUS version. The box of Tim Tam available at Costco lists ingredients including artificial color additives such as Red 40, Yellow 6, and Blue 1, which are not listed in the ingredients of the Tim Tam cookies sold there.
The Tim Tam Slam craze has even reached celebrities. Aussie actress Isla Fisher recently gave Kelly Clarkson a masterclass on The Kelly Clarkson Show. And Sarah Snook, the Australian actress in Succession, also gave a lesson to Jimmy Fallon while on the Tonight Show, both dipping their Tim Tams in tea.
The Tim Tam Slam trend has gone virtual on TikTok, with users sharing their “Aussie culture” and posting tutorials on how to “Slam” properly.
One Redditor bought 8-9 cases “because they are the BEST store-bought cookie. I’m willing to die on that hill,” they wrote. One said to Australian travelers: “Highly recommend a second suitcase so you can bring back as many species as possible and impress your friends.”
Costco is not only introducing international values, but also a new payment system to improve the customer experience, with new scanning technology and digital membership cards that improve checkout speed by up to 20%.
