October 13, 2024 by Amy
ALDI: A Love Story
People. I know I’m late to the party, but I should get credit for finally arriving, right?
Hi, my name is Amy, and I am an ALDI shopper. An ALDI fangirl. An ALDI enthusiast, if you will.
Yes, yes, I know a ton of you are out there going, “Well, duh, Amy. I’ve been shopping there for years. This is not impressive.” I get it. You can sit there on your sanctimonious high horse and look down your noses at those of us who routinely cook with fish sauce and rice noodles, neither of which can be found at ALDI.
I feel compelled to explain that my resistance was not tied to any feeling of loyalty to fancy brands. It was purely logistical. I shopped at a local discount market for years until it was bought out by a larger regional market and closed. As a working mom, success was feeding my family good, nutritious meals on a regular basis. Every Saturday or Sunday I would dutifully make my meal plan, coordinating around how many evening events we had and what time we could be expected to arrive at home. Eating together as a family was a priority for me, and I worked hard to make it happen every night. Because of the job and the parenting and the cleaning and the laundry and the bill paying and all the other nine million things I had to get done each week, I didn’t have time to go to more than one grocery store.
So I went to the store where I knew I could get everything: a 75,000 square foot culinary palace, replete with cheese from around the world (and actual cheesemongers) and not just one brand of dried basil but five. I could get everything I needed there for the week, including fish sauce and rice sticks, if necessary. My shopping list was laid out in the path I traversed to get through the store. How on earth could a 20,000 square foot grocery store stock what I need? Not to mention that the first time we went into ALDI years ago, just to check it out, one of the freezer compartment doors tried to amputate my foot. (Seriously, why would you make a swinging door stop one inch above the ground, the perfect height to jam over a toe in a Birkenstock? I expect more from German designers, those who have given us BMW, Bauhaus, and Mercedes.) Given the lack of rice sticks and the injurious nature of the frozen food section, I was pretty dead-set against ALDI.
Early last summer, I went to lunch with a friend I respect and admire. He’s a smart guy and has given me solid advice before. In the course of our conversation, he and his wife touted the benefits of shopping at ALDI, mainly that they cut their grocery bills in half, if not more. Glen shared that Cara had been asking him to try ALDI for a while, but since he makes All The Fancy Food, he resisted. In the spirit of compromise, he had promised they’d shop there for a month. He was sold after the first week. “They have nearly everything we need, and I’ve gotten creative around the few things they don’t carry,” he said. Hmmm. If a foodie like Glen likes ALDI, there’s a good chance I can make it work.
I came home and told M we had to start storing a quarter in the car’s cup holder. As soon as he heard “save money,” he was in. The next weekend, instead of the behemoth grocery store, we hit ALDI.
I was immediately frustrated simply because I couldn’t find anything. Different store, different layout. I took a deep breath and remembered that I had to hang in there and simply learn the layout of the new store. Although it took obscenely long (pretty sure we circled the produce section no less than six times), I did actually find everything I needed on my shopping list. I was pleasantly surprised. And I knew that, with time, I’d have the layout memorized and would be able to shop efficiently* once again.
Since then, we have been faithful ALDI shoppers. While I have obviously noticed that our weekly spend is vastly lower, I wanted cold, hard data to share with you. Today, I logged into our credit card site and input some numbers into a spreadsheet. Our last full month of shopping at the old store, we paid $655.64 for groceries. Our last full month of shopping at ALDI when our child still lived at home (apples to apples, yo), we paid $353.71 for groceries. We saved almost $302 simply by going to the smaller store across the street. In addition to the financial impact, there are a lot of other benefits, too:
- We bag our own groceries, which means they are bagged the right way, every time. And quickly.
- Because the store is smaller, there is typically only one “brand” of each item. I don’t have to hunt through eighteen brands of tomato sauce trying to find the store brand that I know will be the least expensive. This saves an inordinate amount of time.
- For reasons unknown, the busiest time at ALDI is always less busy than the bigger store. ALDI shoppers also seem to be more cognizant of others around them. We all just wanna get in and get out.
- There is typically only one cashier going at ALDI but since they move at lightning speed, I spend far less time waiting in line than I did at my old store. Seriously, these checkout people are on crack or something. The first time Zoe shopped with me, I had to pick her jaw up off the conveyor belt. She was used to the old store, where you could put your home on the market, host a couple of open houses, negotiate a fair selling price, and close while waiting to check out.
- The fruit is better. I don’t know why. It just is.
- They have a ton of fancy cheeses, too. Who knew! (Just no mongers, which is fine by me. I’m happy being monger-free to pay a fraction of the price for cheese.)
The biggest bonus benefit, which actually negatively impacts the total at the end of the receipt, deserves its own section, not just a bullet point. ALDI regulars know what I’m going to say: The ALDI Aisle of Shame. ALDI, to be fair, calls this section “ALDI Finds,” which is much more positive than the AoS. This is actually two aisles in our ALDI that is routinely stocked with seasonal decor, shoes, pet supplies, kitchen tools, pajamas, furniture, candles, food storage containers, stuffed animals, and more. You never know what you’re going to find in the ALDI Aisle of Shame, which is what makes it so fun. So far I have managed to resist most of the treasures there, although we did purchase this pillow for Zoe and then ship it to California:
*I will say that the Aisle of Shame considerably slows down our path through the store. It greatly decreases the efficiency of our weekly shopping excursion. Each week there are new items and nothing is stocked with any sort of order, so one is forced to slowly amble down the aisle. You don’t want to miss anything. Also, it’s much harder to peruse the AoS when you’re shopping with an engineer, who a.) likes to stick the planned list and b.) questions every. single. purchase. I recommend shopping the Aisle of Shame sans engineer. (Reader, he did not question the rocket pillow. He was too busy laughing at it.)
To be fair, there are still things I have to pop into the other, bigger store for. There is no substitute for the distilled water that my CPAP requires, for instance. And I’ve yet to find rice sticks at ALDI even though I look every week just in case. But we’ve found that we can bank a list of those items and hit the big store about once a month. Not too bad.
So, thank you to Glen and Cara for opening my eyes and helping my pocketbook. Thank you to my sister who has taught me how to effectively plan for and navigate the Aisle of Shame. And thank you to ALDI, which has made grocery shopping easier, fun, and less expensive, so long as I keep my feet clear of those freezer case doors. Consider me a devotee for life.
Note: I will not be joining the ALDI Aisle of Shame Facebook page. As much as I love ALDI, that just feels like crossing a line or something. A girl has to have boundaries.
Second Note: it’s ALDI, people. Not Aldi’s. Same for Nordstrom. There’s like a forty-foot sign on the building that has neither an apostrophe nor an s at the end.
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