From a bird's-eye view, everything's fine...maybe even great. Club-based retailer Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ: COST) topped its sales and earnings estimates for the quarter ending in August, and followed that up by reporting 6% sales growth for the month of September: full steam ahead?

But when you dig into the details of the store chain's monthly sales, things may not be so great. A big chunk of last month's top-line growth actually came from the addition of new stores, rather than increased sales at existing stores. Same-store sales in the United States (where Costco does most of its business) were only up 3.2% last month.

That's the second month in a row the pace of growth has fallen, renewing a trend of waning same-store sales growth since 2021's peak. In and of itself, that isn't catastrophic. After all, the COVID-19 pandemic created an unthinkable scenario that was ultimately bullish for the consumer-goods retailer.

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Source Fool.com