Summer nostalgia just got a permanent spot in the bakery case. Costco’s newest Kirkland Signature creation, the Waffle Cone Bar Cake, is built to look and taste like a soft-serve cone straight off an ice cream truck — minus the risk of it melting all over your hand before you finish it. The $18.99, 40-ounce bar cake has been popping up in select warehouses since late June, and shoppers who’ve spotted it are already saying one is not going to be enough.
A Bakery Case Cake That Channels Childhood Summers
The bar cake starts with a soft, waffle-cone-flavored sponge layered with rich frosting and crumbled bits of actual waffle cone, then gets finished with a swoop of chocolate drizzle for that classic soft-serve look. The real showstopper, though, is on top: three mini waffle cones, each one hand-filled with chocolate and icing to look exactly like a fresh-dipped scoop of ice cream. It’s a small detail, but it’s the kind of presentation that stops people mid-stride in the bakery aisle — part cake, part throwback to chasing down the jingle of an ice cream truck as a kid.
“This tastes just like ice cream — no joke!”
— Costco shopper, via Instagram
Shoppers who’ve gotten their hands on it early are gushing. Reviewers describe the sponge as unbelievably soft and moist, with enough waffle cone flavor running through the cake itself that it reads more like a frozen treat than a bakery dessert. Comments have been stacking up fast under early sightings online, with fans tagging friends and admitting the only real problem with the cake is the willpower it takes not to buy two on one trip.
Where to Find It (and Whether It’ll Stick Around)
So far, the Waffle Cone Bar Cake has been spotted in warehouses across Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Ohio, with shoppers elsewhere hoping it makes its way to their local Costco soon. Like most Kirkland Signature bakery items, it’s likely riding the same rotating schedule Costco uses for its seasonal cakes — meaning it could disappear from shelves as quickly as it arrived once summer winds down. If your warehouse has it now, that’s less a guarantee and more a limited window.
At $18.99 for a 40-ounce cake, it lands solidly in Costco’s usual bakery sweet spot: pricier than a sheet cake slice, but a fraction of what a specialty ice cream cake would cost for a similar amount of dessert. It’s already drawing comparisons to some of Costco’s other bar cake releases, and early buyers say it holds up well in the fridge for days without the frosting breaking down — a real advantage over anything that actually has to stay frozen.
Should You Grab One?
If you grew up chasing the ice cream truck down the street, this cake is basically built for you. It leans hard into that specific kind of nostalgia — the cone, the drizzle, the soft-serve swirl — while still functioning as a normal bakery cake you can leave out at a party without anyone worrying about a melted mess. Given how quickly Costco’s seasonal bakery items tend to sell through, and how loud the early reactions have already been, this is one of those items worth grabbing on sight rather than waiting to see if it’s still there next week.
It also fits neatly into the running list of nostalgic bakery mashups Costco has leaned into lately, from mocha crunch bar cakes to fruit-forward summer sheet cakes, each one riffing on a familiar flavor and repackaging it as something you can slice and serve without any of the fuss. The Waffle Cone Bar Cake just happens to hit a very specific memory button for anyone who spent childhood summers waiting on a driveway for the ice cream truck to round the corner.
Photo credits: Hero image — Costco. Second image — PJ McDonnell/Shutterstock.
