Aldi vs. Lidl (sell, sale, items, best)

[MarketStEl]

Residents of East Coast states from New York to Georgia now have a third option for deep-discount, no-frills supermarket shopping.

Lidl (rhymes with "needle"), Aldi's rival in their home country of Germany, opened its first stores in the Washington area three years ago. They're now up to 100 stores and counting, having acquired 27 of them in the acquisition of a Long Island grocery chain last year.

Aldi has set its sights on becoming one of America's biggest supermarket chains — to be specific, No. 2 behind Kroger. Over the last 5 to 10 years, it has upped its game on all fronts, remodeling its stores to make them more attractive, improving the quality of its private-label products, improving its produce departments and adding a changing variety of specialty products as well as expanding its organic and gluten-free selections.

Lidl has the same operating philosophy as Aldi, and the stores are similar in appearance but slightly larger. I recently shopped the first Lidl store to open in the city of Philadelphia; it opened last year and is located in the Port Richmond section of the city.

How many of you have shopped at both, and how do the chains compare in your estimation? Here's mine:

Product variety: Lidl. Two of the ways this chain distinguishes itself from Aldi are its in-store bakeries and fresh flowers. Its produce, meat and fish/seafood sections are also larger, and you can get grass-fed beef regularly at Lidl while it's a rare sight at Aldi. Own-brand nuts make up a greater proportion of Lidl's snack selections too. Aldi, however, has much better chocolate, a greater range of deli cheeses, and a wider selection of organic products.

Specialty foods: Aldi. Lidl does have some standouts, like smoked salmon, but the range of specialty items is greater at Aldi, especially in the packaged deli meats and cheeses, and it changes with the seasons.

Product quality: Aldi by a hair. In my case, it was the cream cheese that did it: Lidl's has a metallic off-taste. (You can also get high-protein Greek cream cheese at Aldi. I haven't seen this item yet in any other regular supermarket.)

Store appearance: Lidl, by a hair. Both have the warehouse-chic look down cold. Aldi stores have more attractive wall decorations; Lidl stores, wider aisles and better lighting over the produce. One more point in Lidl's favor: The first things you see at Lidl are the bakery, flowers and produce, more like what you would see upon entering a regular supermarket. Aldi takes you past the salty snacks, chocolate and bread before letting you at the produce.

Price: Tie, but: Lidl has a loyalty program that offers discounts on selected products as well as on your entire bill after you meet spending thresholds.

Overall: Lidl, again by a hair. But since there are two Aldi stores convenient to me, and two more on the way that I can get to easily, while the one Lidl I can get to easily requires an hour-long trip across the city on public transit, Aldi will continue to get more of my money. (It will also do so because I'm a big cheesehead, and Aldi outdoes Lidl on cheese.)

Your turn....

[don6170]

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

How many of you have shopped at both, and how do the chains compare in your estimation?

We are fortunate to have both in our area. We probably go to Aldi more, as they currently have more locations.

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

Product variety:

I don't expect either to have a choice in products (eg you want ketchup, here is your one bottle/size to choose from). They both have a pretty good selection of products - soups, cereals, beer, etc.

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

Specialty foods:

I have never looked for anything special.

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

Product quality:

Usually pretty good. I view them as generics. Most are pretty good, but a few are horrible.

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

Store appearance:

Generally very clean

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

Price:

Not much difference

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

Overall:

I'm happy with either and usually pick whichever one is more convenient.

[NewbieHere]

I shopped at both of them when I was in Europe.

[recycled]

Even if a shopper chooses not to shop at Aldi or Lidl in the US, they will benefit everyone in the area. Their low prices on high volume grocery store items keep the prices lower at the traditional grocery stores in the area. When I lived in southern California, that was the impact that the arrival of Aldi had on prices at Ralphs (Kroger), Vons and Albertsons (both owned by Albertsons), and even Walmart grocery stores.

[wpc691]

Originally Posted by recycled

Even if a shopper chooses not to shop at Aldi or Lidl in the US, they will benefit everyone in the area. Their low prices on high volume grocery store items keep the prices lower at the traditional grocery stores in the area. When I lived in southern California, that was the impact that the arrival of Aldi had on prices at Ralphs (Kroger), Vons and Albertsons (both owned by Albertsons), and even Walmart grocery stores.

Wish that would happen here. Aldi opened a little over a year ago, and the prices at Publix have gone up even faster than usual. The only positive to that is it makes an occasional visit to Whole Paycheck less shocking.

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by wpc691

Wish that would happen here. Aldi opened a little over a year ago, and the prices at Publix have gone up even faster than usual. The only positive to that is it makes an occasional visit to Whole Paycheck less shocking.

Aside:

What's shocked me about Whole Paycheck is that you can now afford to eat their produce, which has always been one of that chain's strongest selling points.

I recently learned that produce buyers for supermarkets ask wholesalers for produce that's "plastic," by which they mean the fruits and veggies are uniform (and uniformly free of any blemishes or irregularities) in appearance. No other chain I've been to has produce as plastic as WFM.But it's also handled well and stored well, and it lasts longer in my crisper. The quality of WFM produce IMO stands head and shoulders above any other supermarket chain's, and now that I can buy it for what I'd pay for produce at the Reading Terminal Market here, I've been buying more of it there.

(I joked that when Amazon announced it was buying Whole Foods, they'd change its nickname to "Half Paycheck." They've actually gone some ways towards making that true. But it still helps if you're an Amazon Prime member.)

Having come of age during the real generic-products craze of the late 1970s, I never refer to private-label (store brand) products as "generics." Generics by definition have no brand names, and even a private label has a brand name as well as a company standing behind it, namely, the chain whose brand it is. Most generics were sold without quality guarantees, and product quality varied widely even within the same item type (some cans of peas would have broken peas in them, for instance).

Both Aldi and Lidl stand behind their private-label products with the best quality guarantee in the supermarket world.

Most chains promise to either refund your money or replace the product with another if you don't like it.

Aldi and Lidl do both.

Edited to add: Do they still wrap and package the fresh produce at Publix?

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by don6170

I don't expect either to have a choice in products (eg you want ketchup, here is your one bottle/size to choose from). They both have a pretty good selection of products - soups, cereals, beer, etc.

Several behavioral economists have documented what has been called "the choice paradox": the more varieties of a product you're offered, the less likely you are to buy that product.

Size limitations are one way to get as many different products as possible into a much smaller footprint. It was that sort of "variety" I was referring to. And it seems to me that anyone who's run the gauntlet of a supermarket cereal aisle will appreciate the lower "noise" level at the limited-selection store.

And yes, relying on private-label products for the bulk of the merchandise you sell also keeps costs low, for you don't pay for the advertising the national brands run (or the slottage fees they pay to supermarkets to carry their products if they're not huge sellers).

I should note here, however, that Aldi sticks to its own private-label products 99.99 percent of the time while Lidl does carry some nationally advertised brands.

Usually pretty good. I view them as generics. Most are pretty good, but a few are horrible.

I refer you to my post immediately above.

Generally speaking, I find most store brands acceptable in quality, and some are truly outstanding. But they do vary in quality from chain to chain, and often enough, as you say here, quality varies even within a private-label line. For instance: I have yet to find a private-label line of buttery round crackers that taste as good as Ritz or Town House.

IMO the private-label line with the most consistent quality across the board was the old A&P-family store brand, America's Choice. I note that Save-a-Lot bought the brand off the remains of the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company. However, that makes me no more likely to shop Save-a-Lot than I have in the past. I consider it inferior to either of these chains, though a more recently-opened Save-a-Lot store I visited actually had a produce section that wasn't from hunger.

Essential Everyday, the store brand found in stores supplied by both Supervalu and Albertson's, is IMO the store brand that now has the most consistently high-quality products.

[TexasLawyer2000]

I'm a huge fan of Aldi Nord (called Trader Joes in the US). Aldi Sud (called just "Aldi" in the US) is a bit too bottom of the barrel for me. When I am staying in Europe, I'm always happy to see an Aldi Nord.

I don't go to Lidl.

[ChessieMom]

I have shopped at both, many times. I prefer Lidl over Aldi's. But I prefer Trader Joe's over both of them.

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by ChessieMom

I have shopped at both, many times. I prefer Lidl over Aldi's. But I prefer Trader Joe's over both of them.

"Aldi-meets-Whole Foods."

As noted above, Aldi Nord owns Trader Joe's while Aldi Süd owns Aldi US. Aldi Nord sells Trader Joe's-branded products in its European stores.

But I don't understand why anyone paints a huge gulf between the two Aldi chains. Yes, TJ's specializes in the same sorts of higher-end, organic, specialty stuff WFM does, but IME Aldi's quality compares favorably with regular supermarkets, and they follow the exact same business model.

And they do experiment with interesting and innovative products. I went to Aldi this evening, and in their bread section, they had net-zero-carb (IOW, keto-friendly) whole wheat and multiseed bread (9g carbs + 0g sugars - 9g dietary fiber = 0 net carbs). I'll let you know how it tastes once I've finished the Dave's Killer Bread I bought on my last trip to MOM's Organic Market (5g dietary fiber, the most I've seen on any bread prior to the loaves I bought at Aldi*) and start on these.

Dave's Killer Bread, which I've also seen at some Fresh Grocer (ShopRite sibling) stores near me: $5.49 for a 22-ounce loaf.

L'Oven Fresh Net Zero Carb Bread: $3.49 for a 14-ounce loaf. That's still less per pound.

Edited to add: However, not everything Aldi sells is significantly cheaper than elsewhere. I noticed that the one-pound containers of organic spring mix at Aldi were the same price as Whole Foods charged for them. In general, produce is one area where some items Aldi carries cost as much as or more than I pay at a good produce market (like the Reading Terminal Market here) or Whole Foods.

*Lidl, however, sells a high-fiber (also 5g) white bread for $2.49.