AIMS360 connects fashion and apparel brands to Costco Wholesale with built-in EDI for bulk depot shipments and Costco.com e-commerce orders. Automate 850 purchase orders, 855 acknowledgments, depot-ready 856 ASNs, 810 invoices, and GS1-128 / SSCC labeling, with support across Costco U.S., Canada, and Mexico.
AIMS360 is a consumer brands ERP with Costco EDI built in. One platform manages inventory by style, color and size and exchanges every document Costco requires: 850 purchase orders in, 855 acknowledgments, depot-ready 856 ASNs with GS1-128 and SSCC-18 labels, 810 invoices out, for bulk depot and Costco.com, across the US, Canada and Mexico. No separate EDI provider, and the connection is fully managed by our EDI team.
Costco EDI is the electronic data interchange Costco Wholesale uses to run supplier orders: purchase orders, shipment notices and invoices moving as standardized ANSI X12 files instead of email or PDFs. Costco made full EDI compliance mandatory for apparel and consumer goods vendors in 2024, before the first shipment leaves your dock.
What trips brands up is how unforgiving Costco's version is. Its depots run as fast flow cross docks, so the 856 ASN has to land before the truck and mirror the physical pallet down to every SSCC barcode. The ASN follows Costco's Enterprise 856 v4010 hierarchy, every carton and pallet needs a GS1-128 label that matches the file, and the 850, 856 and 810 all have to reconcile under an automated three way match before Costco pays. Miss any of it and deductions stack up. Industry guides put unreadable or mislabeled cartons at roughly $5 to $10 each, and retail chargebacks as a whole can swallow a meaningful slice of a supplier's margin.
AIMS360 closes that gap by building the EDI into the apparel ERP itself. POs land in your system, inventory allocates, the warehouse prints compliant labels, the ASN fires at scan and ship, and the invoice reconciles automatically. Bulk depot and Costco.com alike, across the US, Canada and Mexico. One platform owns the order from the 850 to the paid 810, which is the difference between passing Costco's checks on the first attempt and chasing chargebacks after the fact.
The core Costco transaction set, what each document does on an order, and when it is due.
| EDI document | Direction | What it does on a Costco order | Timing |
|---|---|---|---|
| 850 Purchase Order | Costco to you | The order: styles, quantities, and ship to depot or member address | Inbound |
| 855 PO Acknowledgment | You to Costco | Confirms acceptance, substitutions or backorders | Within 24 hrs of 850 |
| 860 PO Change | Costco to you | Revisions to an existing PO: quantities, dates or items, before you ship | As needed |
| 856 ASN | You to Costco | Shipment, order, pack and item hierarchy with SSCC-18 barcodes | Before the truck |
| 810 Invoice | You to Costco | Bills the shipment; must match the 850 and 856 exactly | After the ASN |
| 997 Functional Ack | Both ways | Confirms an EDI document was received and structurally valid | Within 24 hrs |
| 812 Credit / Debit | Both ways | Adjusts pricing or quantity disputes and chargebacks | As needed |
| 820 Remittance | Costco to you | Payment detail used to reconcile what Costco actually paid | On payment |
| 846 / 852 | Both ways | Inventory advice and product activity (sell through) data, where used | Per program |
ST*850*0001 / BEG*00*SA*4500098765**20260621 / REF*DP*0042 / DTM*002*20260705 / N1*ST*COSTCO DEPOT 0123*UL*0078742000000 / PO1*1*240*EA*12.50**UP*012345678905 / CTT*1 / SE*9*0001. Illustrative only. Costco's published implementation guide defines the exact segments, qualifiers and the Enterprise 856 v4010 ASN structure, and AIMS360 maps to your assigned Costco spec during implementation.Sell to Costco as a bulk depot vendor, fulfill Costco.com e-commerce orders direct to members, or run both. AIMS360 connects every channel through built in apparel EDI and a single inventory pool.
Costco depots are fast flow cross docks, not warehouses. AIMS360 builds the full 850 to 856 to 810 cycle with the pack and pallet detail Costco receivers expect.
Costco.com member orders route through Rithum, formerly CommerceHub, and AIMS360 connects natively. A PO drops into the OMS, reserves stock, and ships from your DC or 3PL.
Costco needs an accurate number at every node. The AIMS360 OMS and WMS keep one available to sell pool across every fulfillment location.
Costco US, Canada and Mexico on one instance, with VICS BOLs generated automatically for cross border LTL and TL loads.
AIMS360 sits between Costco and your warehouse, turning every EDI document into a warehouse action, and every action back into the exact message Costco's depot and accounts payable systems expect.
Costco transmits the PO. AIMS360 imports it, validates against your product catalog and Costco specific business rules, and flags anything off before it hits the floor.
AIMS360 confirms acceptance, substitutions or backorders inside Costco's required 24 hour window, keeping your vendor scorecard clean.
The OMS reserves units across your DCs and 3PLs. The WMS releases the order to pick with the Costco ship by date enforced.
Mobile scanning, pallet build, GS1-128 / SSCC labels, Costco packing slips, VICS BOL and carrier rate shop, all native.
The depot ready ASN fires the moment the last carton is scanned, built to Costco's full shipment, pack and item hierarchy and matched to the physical pallet. This removes the number one source of Costco chargebacks.
AIMS360 invoices Costco through accounting, reconciled line by line to the 850 and 856 so it clears Costco's three way match. The 997 is acknowledged automatically.
Costco made full EDI compliance mandatory for suppliers in 2024. These are the specs AIMS360 handles on every Costco order, bulk depot and Costco.com, so your team never tracks the spec sheet by hand.
| Required documents | 850 PO, 855 acknowledgment, 856 ASN, 810 invoice and 997, plus 812, 820 and 852 where Costco uses them |
| 855 timing | PO acknowledgment returned within 24 hours of the 850 |
| 856 ASN | Enterprise 856 v4010 hierarchy of shipment, order, pack and item. Must arrive before the truck |
| 997 timing | Functional acknowledgment returned within 24 hours of any inbound document |
| Labels | GS1-128 (UCC-128) on every carton and pallet with a unique SSCC-18, matched to the ASN |
| Pallet and packaging | Ti-Hi pallet configuration (cartons per tier by tiers high), carton weight limits, and club or membership ready pack labeling |
| Transmission | Secure protocols only: AS2, SFTP or HTTPS through Costco's designated network |
| Matching | Automated three way match of the 850, 856 and 810 before payment |
| Freight | VICS BOL on LTL and TL loads, including Costco Canada and Mexico cross border |
Costco does not publish a self serve supplier portal and does not run open vendor onboarding. Entry is buyer led and category routed, so treat the requirement set above as what you must be ready for once a buyer engages, not a checklist that gets you in the door. Requirements come from the vendor guidelines Costco issues to you and can change. For cross border freight, see the full VICS BOL guide.
Costco Canada is a separate buying organization, not a branch of the US business. It operates as Costco Wholesale Canada Ltd, runs Western and Eastern Canada buying offices, issues its own Vendor ID and runs its own EDI testing including X12 810 invoicing. Costco Mexico adds cross border and currency requirements on top.
Brands selling into more than one Costco region often end up running parallel setups in separate systems, which is exactly where data drifts and chargebacks start. AIMS360 keeps every Costco region on one platform. Your catalog, inventory and EDI maps live in a single apparel ERP, with multi currency invoicing for Canadian and Mexican orders and a shared available to sell pool across borders.
Under the federal Consumer Packaging and Labelling Act, the product identity and net quantity declarations must appear in both English and French on the principal display panel. In Quebec, the Charter of the French Language as amended by Bill 96 goes further: since 1 June 2025, generic terms and product descriptions must be in French regardless of trademark registration status. Product manufactured before that date may be distributed until 1 June 2027, but only where no French version of the mark had been registered by 26 June 2024. The separate rule that French inscriptions be at least as prominent as any other language has applied since 1977 and has no grace period.
This is packaging and ticketing work that has to be reflected in your item master before the first Canadian PO, which is why running Canada out of a second system tends to surface as a receiving exception rather than a catalog problem. Confirm current requirements with your Costco buyer and with counsel, as the rules continue to be interpreted.
The questions apparel, footwear and consumer brands raise before starting Costco onboarding on AIMS360.
AIMS360 exchanges Costco's full transaction set: 850 purchase order, 855 PO acknowledgment, 856 ASN, 810 invoice and 997 functional acknowledgment, plus 820 remittance, 852 product activity and 860 PO change where Costco uses them. It also produces Costco GS1-128 / SSCC labels and VICS BOLs on the ANSI ASC X12 standard. Because EDI is native to the apparel software, you do not run a separate EDI product beside your ERP.
Costco depots are fast flow cross docks. Product is received, sorted by destination club and staged for outbound within hours, so the 856 ASN has to arrive before the truck and match the physical pallet exactly, down to every SSCC-18. AIMS360 builds that shipment, pack and item hierarchy automatically as cartons are scanned in the WMS, validates it against the 850, and transmits at scan and ship, which removes the most common reason Costco receivers reject or charge back a load.
Every Costco carton and pallet needs a GS1-128 barcode with a unique SSCC-18, and that data has to match the ASN hierarchy. AIMS360 generates the labels in the built in WMS at pack time, assigns the SSCC sequence, and writes the same values into the ASN, so the label on the box and the data in the file never drift. Mismatched label and ASN data is a frequent cause of Costco reship requests, and tying both to one source closes that gap.
Most Costco chargebacks come from late or inaccurate ASNs, label mismatches, missed delivery appointments and invoice errors. AIMS360 stops these at the source: the OMS enforces ship by dates, the WMS prints compliant labels and packing slips, ASNs fire at scan and ship matched to the shipment, and invoices reconcile before they send. For deductions that still land, the built in chargeback management tools log, route and dispute claims with documentation attached.
Yes. Costco runs automated three way matching, comparing the 850, 856 and 810 line by line, and any quantity, SKU or price discrepancy can trigger a deduction or payment hold. AIMS360 keeps all three documents on one record, so the invoice is generated from the same order and shipment data the ASN reported. The numbers reconcile by design instead of being re keyed across separate systems.
Yes. Costco.com e-commerce and member dropship orders typically route through Rithum, formerly CommerceHub, and AIMS360 connects to that channel natively. Orders flow into the OMS, stock is reserved in real time, the built in WMS handles pick, pack and ship from your DC or 3PL, and tracking and invoices return automatically. You can run Costco bulk depot and Costco.com dropship from the same inventory pool.
Yes. AIMS360 supports Costco Wholesale across the US, Canada and Mexico from one platform, including cross border compliance and multi currency invoicing. Master data, inventory and EDI mapping live in a single apparel ERP, so adding a Costco region does not mean a second system or a re keyed catalog.
Treat it as separate. Costco Wholesale Canada Ltd is a distinct legal entity with its own Western and Eastern Canada buying offices, its own vendor inquiry channel at costco.ca, its own Vendor ID and its own EDI certification round. We have not been able to verify from a public source that the ISA qualifier and ID values differ, so confirm those with your Costco contact rather than assuming either way. What is certain is that Canadian item setup, bilingual labeling and invoicing are their own workstream.
Federally, the Consumer Packaging and Labelling Act requires the product identity and net quantity declarations in both English and French on the principal display panel. The dealer name and address may be in either language. In Quebec, Bill 96 amendments to the Charter of the French Language mean that since 1 June 2025 generic terms and product descriptions must be in French regardless of trademark registration, with a distribution grace period to 1 June 2027 for product manufactured before that date where no French version of the mark was registered by 26 June 2024. The prominence rule for French has applied since 1977. Confirm current requirements with counsel, as interpretation continues to develop.
Costco requires suppliers to certify and transmit through its designated EDI network over secure protocols such as AS2, SFTP or HTTPS. AIMS360 builds and processes the EDI in house and connects through the network Costco mandates, so you are not bolting a separate EDI product onto your ERP. AIMS360 charges no per document, per kilocharacter or VAN fees of its own, which keeps EDI cost flat as Costco volume grows. The implementation team handles the Costco mapping, test rounds and certification with you.
Costco runs its own multi round certification covering your 850, 856 and 810 documents plus GS1-128 labels, so part of the timeline is gated by Costco's test schedule. Most brands go live in roughly three to five weeks. AIMS360 starts from pre built, Costco tested maps and label rules rather than building from scratch, which removes most of the mapping iterations that stretch first time onboarding.
Yes. AIMS360 manages pack by pallet configurations, prepacks, ratios and size curves for Costco depot shipments, and processes very high volume, including a single customer running over 1.2 million orders per day. Peak warehouse club buys and seasonal apparel programs stay within scale, with the WMS handling pallet build, carton labeling and the ASN hierarchy each load needs.
Yes. AIMS360 connects to your 3PL so Costco depot and Costco.com orders can ship from an outside warehouse while AIMS360 still owns the EDI. The 3PL prints Costco compliant GS1-128 / SSCC labels or sends shipment data back, and AIMS360 generates and transmits the depot ready 856 ASN tied to the correct PO and shipment ID. Inventory across your DC, 3PL and stores stays in one available to sell pool, so Costco never sees a stale number.
A standalone Costco EDI tool sits beside your ERP: two systems, two vendors, and constant reconciliation between what the tool sent and what the ERP shipped, which is exactly the drift that produces three way match deductions. AIMS360 is a fashion native ERP with EDI, OMS, WMS, PLM and accounting in one platform. For Costco you get pre built maps, depot ready ASNs, GS1-128 / SSCC labeling, and one team owning the full lifecycle across a 350 plus retailer network with no per transaction fees.
Costco does not run open, self serve vendor onboarding. A Costco buyer approves you as a supplier and a Vendor ID is issued before EDI onboarding begins, and only then does Costco invite you to test and certify your documents. AIMS360's implementation team configures your maps to that Vendor ID and runs the send and receive testing with you, so 850s flow in and 855, 856 and 810s flow back automatically once you go live. The same setup covers Costco US and Costco Canada Vendor IDs from one apparel ERP.
Yes, fraudsters do send fake Costco purchase order emails to vendors, which is one reason real Costco orders move over a secured EDI connection rather than loose email attachments. With AIMS360, genuine Costco 850 POs arrive through the certified EDI channel and validate against your catalog and Vendor ID before they ever reach the warehouse, so a spoofed PO has nowhere to land. Treat any Costco order that shows up as a plain email attachment as suspect and confirm it through your buyer.
AIMS360 has spent four decades building software for apparel, footwear, beauty and consumer goods brands, the same brands that ship Costco depots and Costco.com. EDI, OMS, WMS, PLM and accounting sit in one platform, so Costco compliance is part of the system rather than a bolt on. Beyond Yoga, acquired by Levi Strauss & Co. for roughly $400M, scaled on AIMS360. Read how brands scaled on AIMS360 or book a Costco EDI demo.
Run Costco alongside the rest of your high volume retail accounts, from one AIMS360 instance, one inventory pool and no per document fees.
Last reviewed 6 August 2026 by the AIMS360 EDI team. Reviewed against Costco's published X12 850, 856 and 810 transaction set, the Enterprise 856 v4010 ASN hierarchy, and the federal Consumer Packaging and Labelling Act and Quebec Bill 96 labeling rules in force as of that date. Costco's requirements are issued to each vendor through its own guidelines and can change without notice.
A 30 minute live demo on your own depot, Costco.com and dropship orders, built for consumer brands.
