The Bass Pro That Never Came Just Got a Costco

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Costco just paid roughly $750,000 an acre for dirt off I-26. In North Charleston land terms, that is a buyer who has stopped kicking the tires.

The Post & Courier reports the company closed on 29 acres inside Ingleside for about $21.7 million, bought from an affiliate of Daniel Island's Weber USA. Run the math and it lands near $17 a square foot for raw land. Warehouse clubs do not pay that for a maybe.

The public paper trail started this summer. A site development plan filed with the S.C. Department of Environmental Services, first reported by What Now Charleston in early July, shows a 181,000-square-foot warehouse and a fuel canopy at 9000 Blue House Road. Live 5 put the permitted site at about 28 acres beside the interstate.

That would make it Costco number three for the region, after Ashley Town Center Drive in West Ashley and Park Avenue Boulevard in Mount Pleasant. A Costco spokesperson declined to comment to What Now, citing the project's pending status.

The part worth circling is the road.

The Palmetto Commerce Interchange is a $54 million diamond on I-26 between Ashley Phosphate Road and Highway 78, paid for with the 2016 half-cent transportation sales tax. It ties Weber Boulevard and Palmetto Commerce Parkway into the interstate. It was on track to finish by the end of 2025, a couple of months early, and a developer release in September called it recently completed.

Retail anchors follow access. Public money built the ramps. A private buyer showed up with $21.7 million within a year of the ramps opening.

Ingleside has waited a long time for this kind of tenant. Back in December 2013, Live 5 announced Bass Pro Shops would anchor a 2-million-square-foot mixed-use project at Ingleside Plantation North, with a store of 130,000 to 150,000 square feet opening in 2015. According to the Post & Courier, the Costco tract is the land once earmarked for that store. You can drive by. There is no bass boat showroom.

The rooftops are arriving now too. Thompson Thrift started building The Whitmore at Ingleside in September, 327 apartments on about 19 acres near the new interchange, with first move-ins targeted for November 2027. The master plan covers roughly 1,500 acres.

The bigger chess move is about 200 miles up the road. Costco is putting a $240 million distribution center at I-77 and Porter Road in Rock Hill, per Bisnow: 541,000 square feet on 168 acres, about 165 jobs, and supply for 20 warehouses across the Carolinas and Georgia. It is scheduled to open in 2027. A store fed from Rock Hill wants a fast shot off the interstate. This one gets an on-ramp.

A few things still are not public. The Post & Courier says the site plan calls for 32 pumps, and that Blue House Road has yet to appear among the openings Costco posts on its site. The company only talks about locations within about three months of opening.

So there is no opening date yet. When Blue House Road shows up on Costco's openings page, that is roughly your three-month warning.

Sources: What Now Charleston (site plan, building size, address, existing stores), Live 5 (permitted acreage), Live 5 (2013 Bass Pro plan), Charleston Industrial (interchange cost, funding, schedule), Business Wire (Whitmore apartments, Ingleside acreage), Bisnow (Rock Hill distribution center) and the Post & Courier (sale price, acreage, seller, Bass Pro tract, pump count, opening-list status)