Aldi & other markets discussion
 

Every Sunday night I go to Planet Fitness (I go here only one night because the other 6 I'm at the country club and they are closed Mondays). Anyway next door is an Aldi and a month ago I started shopping there and I must say it's great. They have an easy concept to purchase and I have bought many private labeled items and they are as good or better than their national named competitors. Their cost is definitely lower and they also sell wine and beer. It sort of reminds me of a (Tesco owned) US based store called Fresh N Easy in Scottsdale 10 years ago (but those didn't work).

This isn’t about clones of the character portrayed by Brad Pitt in Inglourious Basterds? :confused:

Lt Aldo

:D

I began shopping at Aldi when they started accepting credit cards. Neat place.

Central Market rules.

You're not going to find any SMU sorority hotties at an Aldi in Frisco.

(Though I once passed up a near guaranteed threesome (either that or a kidney theft) when I was browsing the fine wine cabinet at a Tom Thumb while a couple of already heavily sloshed girls shopping for cheap prosecco started chatting me up)

It's really weird to me how Aldi is perceived in different places. In Germany it was a bog standard grocery store, nothing remarkable. In the UK it is seen as the place 'poor' people / social miscreants shop. In the US it is seen as almost edgy and trendy to shop at Aldi and I see it alongside Trader Joes for 'best own brand product' articles frequently. The only US stores I have been to didn't seem to have the 'strange stuff' aisle in the middle of the store like the UK ones have - where you can buy things like horse halters one month, tents the next month, or a ping pong set the third - never the same items, never predictable!

Personally, I have just never been able to do a full shop at one in any of the locations. There are always some products I prefer a brand name for, and items they don't carry either own or on label brands. So it doesn't make much sense to me as a primary grocery store (not that I have one where I live now). I do like some of the things they carry, especially seasonal products (picked up some nice European treats in Dec 2019 in NY). Things like vanilla extract, and other oddball items are great value in there because they bring the actual European products to a market that is skewed weirdly high priced for those sorts of things or that has a lot of substandard products (like vanilla essence instead).

I wouldn't be seen dead in Aldi. Full of riff raff.

Trader Joe’s is owned by Aldi. :idea:

More precisely it is owned by Aldi Nord, whereas Aldi Süd trades in the US as Aldi.

In the UK, not in many other markets. In Germany you can see the whole cross section of society at Ali and Lidl.

I have to agree with this. When I was at my mom's in Tenterden over Christmas I mentioned stopping in to get some goodies. She looked at me as if I was I was daft and said "no, it's quite dodgy in there". Different here in the US.

Many Tescos are similarly dodgy. Asda, Morrison’s also. Insert usual stereotype of fat pale people in tracksuits with badly-behaved children buying frozen burgers and chips and plenty of cheap beer. Waitrose is usually the safe bet in the UK.

I wish we had Central Market in Chicago! And Wegman's.

When I lived in the UK as a university student years ago, I went to a local Aldi. There was no stigma there, perhaps because of the student population. I liked it for the quirky items and Germanness.

In the US, it has varied over time and by location. I'd say 20 years ago it was seen as more low class in places I've lived (DC, KC, Chicago, Dallas). In recent years, it's picked up a bit of a trendiness vibe and newer/renovated Aldi's seem fairly nice. (It maybe always had a trendy vibe near US universities...that part I don't know.) I have ventured into Aldi a couple times since they began accepting credit cards - the clientele was not noticeably different from any other area grocery store except perhaps gourmet/boutique stores.

Trader Joe's has always been trendy to the point where some people get obnoxious or borderline culty about it. Aldi isn't like that (yet).

LOL

LOL, people still wear tracksuits? I think I had one in the 1980s but that bad boy died and went directly to fashion hell long, long ago.