The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Ask a Mustachian => Topic started by: PencilThinMustache on July 01, 2014, 04:30:18 AM
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One month ago I ventured on here with our family's massive spending budget and asked for some suggestions on how to whittle down expenses. I have some (OK, well lots) of work to do. But also have some positive progress to report.
The first was related to our $750/mo grocery budget/habit. I embarked on an experiment to only shop at Aldi, not the usually bi-weekly trips to the local upscale Publix chain. Of course I failed. Went to Sam's Club as well as a local butcher/fish shop, but managed to avoid Publix save for one trip to buy milk for our son.
I should qualify this by pointing out that despite the budget being 750, we routinely spent $800 or more monthly on groceries
The June result: $458
We nearly trimmed it in HALF. Now I know it will seem high to many of you still, but the fact remains that with little "sacrifice" we were able to strip nearly $400 off our budget. The challenge of saving money appealed to my wife who has taken up some "couponing" endeavors to save even more. Im pretty confident we can get it below $400. and let me be clear: we still ate like kings. Fresh meats, fruits, veggies and paleo goodness (not all organic though).
Now I'm ready for the next challenge! Thanks for your support Mustachians!
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That's fantastic! I love Aldi's, especially their fruit and veg sales. We just recently became Costco members, and I'm still trying to navigate what is a deal there and what is not.
If your wife will work your menus around what goes on sale/what she has a coupon for plus you start buying in bulk on some items, it will get even lower! Also, paleo is pretty meat heavy (or at least what I've seen) but we've been known to make a large steak last by slicing it thinly and tossing with vegetables - we've gotten 2 meals out of one steak before for our family of 4 (to be fair, our kids are little!). So consider really stretching out your meat or going meatless a few nights a week as veg and sides are usually less per pound than meat.
But good job! That's fantastic progress.
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Congrats on your first month! With three of us in the house (2 adults/1 college student), we manage to stay roughly around the $100/week level. It's also easier to make budget in the summer because produce prices fall, we don't tend to eat as heavily because we're outside more, and we eat less meat/more produce due to fresh, local supply. Some folks on this board beat that number, but that's a number that's below the family budget of every friend and family I personally know (if we've ever discussed such things). To get lower would require much more work for less savings...diminishing returns and all that.
The one thing we did change this spring was that we bought a nearly new bike trailer, put a sturdy "floor" in it, and now use it exclusively to go to the grocery stores, produce stand, and farmer's market. That is an effort to minimize costs and maximize life that we embrace.
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After years of hearing about Aldi, I finally got to go into one last week while visiting NY State.
I thought they had very good prices on staples compared to the local stores.
I hope they come to Texas soon.
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After years of hearing about Aldi, I finally got to go into one last week while visiting NY State.
I thought they had very good prices on staples compared to the local stores.
I hope they come to Texas soon.
There's one down the street from me in Houston. I had never heard of Aldi until I saw it posted on here. Then I noticed the store about 2 weeks later. Still haven't been in there though... :/
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Make sure you take your quarter for your cart, bring bags to pack up, and be ready to bag your own groceries. My DH didn't realize this and his first trip to Aldi's annoyed him so much he hasn't gone by himself since. LOL. I love it, though, as long as I'm prepared.
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Awesome! It's amazing how much "low hanging fruit" there can be in a bloated budget--stuff that you can improve without even a lifestyle change. Keep it up! I used to live where there was a Publix and I sympathize with the struggle to stay out of it :-).
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That's fantastic! I love Aldi's, especially their fruit and veg sales. We just recently became Costco members, and I'm still trying to navigate what is a deal there and what is not.
Let us know how that works out for you. I shop regularly at Aldi and have considered joining Costco, but I'm convinced Costco is actually any cheaper (let alone cheaper enough to be worth it).
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Sounds obvious, but I've learned to keep a couple of quarters and my packing bags in my car. That way, I am always prepared for Aldi's. (Did this after forgetting a couple times and merrily heading out from home without what I needed--a waste of gas having to go back.) Aldi's grocery bills are routinely half of what I pay at our nearby Giant Eagle--although Aldi's doesn't have everything I need, and I do have to pick up some things at other stores.
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Make sure you take your quarter for your cart, bring bags to pack up, and be ready to bag your own groceries. My DH didn't realize this and his first trip to Aldi's annoyed him so much he hasn't gone by himself since. LOL. I love it, though, as long as I'm prepared.
So, for us new guys, we take our own grocery bags/sacks?
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Make sure you take your quarter for your cart, bring bags to pack up, and be ready to bag your own groceries. My DH didn't realize this and his first trip to Aldi's annoyed him so much he hasn't gone by himself since. LOL. I love it, though, as long as I'm prepared.
So, for us new guys, we take our own grocery bags/sacks?
One interesting thing about Aldi is that they don't take goods out of boxes and set them on shelves individually; instead they merely stack up the inventory in the boxes it gets shipped in and open the first box. The upshot is that if you forget your bags, you can just go grab one of the empty boxes to carry your groceries around in.
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Make sure you take your quarter for your cart, bring bags to pack up, and be ready to bag your own groceries. My DH didn't realize this and his first trip to Aldi's annoyed him so much he hasn't gone by himself since. LOL. I love it, though, as long as I'm prepared.
So, for us new guys, we take our own grocery bags/sacks?
Yup.
Also, if no one mentioned it before, they don't take credit cards.
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The cashiers don't bag, they just put the food in another cart they have standing by. There's a long shelf at the end where you can pause to bag or box up your stuff at your leisure.
The quarters are for the carts. They're linked together and you insert a quarter to release one. You get it back when you bring it back and plug it back in.
It takes some getting used to, but I understand that it helps keep costs down by reducing staff.
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We recently switched to Aldi from our local grocery chain. Cut our monthly Grocery bill for 2 adults from $400 to $200. We get everything but Veggies there, as we stop on the way home at the local Farmers Market. I find I greatly enjoy the way the store is run. I notice they keep their inventory very low, they use limited amount of workers whom they seem to pay well and are happy. They have you bag your own groceries and use the simple quarter trick to get you to return your cart. I also find our local store to be incredibly clean and very efficiently planned. I find our time spend shopping is cut in half from this efficiency as well. I enjoy bagging the groceries when done, as I just marvel at how simple the whole process is, and think about how the savings is passed onto me. I am 100% sold on Aldi.
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Make sure you take your quarter for your cart, bring bags to pack up, and be ready to bag your own groceries. My DH didn't realize this and his first trip to Aldi's annoyed him so much he hasn't gone by himself since. LOL. I love it, though, as long as I'm prepared.
So, for us new guys, we take our own grocery bags/sacks?
Yup.
Also, if no one mentioned it before, they don't take credit cards.
Well that's a bummer. But I guess it's another way they keep costs down.
The whole thing sounds super interesting!
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Totally into Aldi, there Save-a-lot, and Trader Joe's (occasionally) account for 95%+ of our shopping.
Aldi tends to be in much better neighborhoods than Save-a-lot. I'm not scared of much but SaL's tend to make my spidey senses tingle, I walk through the parking lot looking for cover and identifying good spots from which I could return fire, but the prices are great! :)
Did you know that Trader Joe's is owned, though operated independently, by the same family that owns Aldi? I see similarities across many of their product lines and suspect they may often share sources.
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Also, if no one mentioned it before, they don't take credit cards.
True, but you can use your debit card for purchases https://www.aldi.us/en/services/faqs/
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After years of hearing about Aldi, I finally got to go into one last week while visiting NY State.
I thought they had very good prices on staples compared to the local stores.
I hope they come to Texas soon.
We have one in Grand Prairie, Texas. Went once and hated it, but we pretty much only buy meat and veggies, so the selection was pretty sparce for us.
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Just in for the Aldi lovefest...I used to be a doubter now I'm a huge fan! Did you know they carry both almond and soymilk? Be still my non-dairy heart.
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Thanks for the responses!
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From last week's special here, bought 25g of Italian summer black truffles from Aldi. Not as pungent as the winter or French ones...but at $8, I ain't complaining. The Aussie truffles here are charging $50-100 for the same amount.
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I've also been having my own little Aldi experiment. I'm trying extra hard to cut costs because I'm quitting my job to go back to grad school this fall...Right now we'll need to take out about $5k in loans to cover the costs, so every dollar we spend is a $ that we are borrowing & vice versa. It finally dawned on me that Aldi is on one block, 4 blocks south is Target & Jewel, and 4 block north is Food 4 Less.
So now, we go to Aldi first every weekend, then depending on what's left on my list, go to Food 4 Less (cheap meat, but I'm trying not to buy any while it's summer & produce is so affordable), Target (cheap staples and reasonable selection but lousy produce & and I'm SO bad at not buying unnecessary things there), or Jewel (great produce but ridiculous prices). The last three weeks, we've managed to spend only about $60/week, instead of the $100 or so we've been averaging, although to be fair I am draining our freezer some at the same time. I'm really happy with our "experiment" so far though!
I also think that Aldi has really upped their game in terms of selection & product offerings, so if you haven't been in a couple years, take another look! I was really amazed at some of the things they carry & at great prices!
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Meh. Aldi's is not cheaper for me. The regional grocer I shop at has a ridiculously low markup and, as a result, is often cheaper than Aldi's while having INSANE amount of selection.
I tried shopping at Aldi, but if I go there I can no longer justify driving the other direction to shop at the cheap grocer. So then I'm stuck shopping at pricier stores to get what Aldi's doesn't have. Any and all savings kissed goodbye.
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The Aldi in Dallas that I go to carries Almond Milk.
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After years of hearing about Aldi, I finally got to go into one last week while visiting NY State.
I thought they had very good prices on staples compared to the local stores.
I hope they come to Texas soon.
They are in the DFW area. There are two near me that I know of.
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The Aldi in Dallas that I go to carries Almond Milk.
Mine carries soy milk. Haven't looked for almond.
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I have been pleasantly surprised by their selection as well. The produce is above average. Nuts and other dry goods are ridiculously cheap, but we dont eat much in the way of the "dry goods" as a paleo family. The meat selection is somewhat lacking and I prefer to get from local farmer (have half cow on order now!) or at east Sams where you can even get bulk packs of fresh wild alaskan salmon all summer long. Aldi salmon was awful. Just awful. Reminded me of the hospital cafeteria. They even have a gluten free section (I'm not here to judge your dietary habits but just b/c its GF doesnt make it healthy...most looked like junk food with rice instead of wheat).
I guess I agree with the rest of you: Aldi provides good selection of quality products at sometimes astonishingly low prices (avocado was 59 freakin cents!), but you will likely have to make it one of several stops on the weekly shopping train to eat a balanced/picky/specialty diet.
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That's fantastic! I love Aldi's, especially their fruit and veg sales. We just recently became Costco members, and I'm still trying to navigate what is a deal there and what is not.
Let us know how that works out for you. I shop regularly at Aldi and have considered joining Costco, but I'm convinced Costco is actually any cheaper (let alone cheaper enough to be worth it).
It can quickly be worth it if you buy dog food, over the counter meds, and laundry detergent. That stuff is sooo much cheaper at costco.
I _really_ need to get to an aldi. This thread may have pushed me over the edge. There's not one in our town, but there is one a couple of towns over. Not a super convenient location, but fighting some traffic might be worth it with all of these raving reviews!
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Love this post...it's saved me a ton and I tell everyone about it.
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I've been shopping at Aldi since 1999 and I feel like a fool when I shop elsewhere. Seriously, I mentally figure out how much I'm overpaying if I go to Giant Eagle.
Most of the foods are exactly the same as name-brand, but you can save so much because of they way Aldi has optimized the procedures in the store. Checking out is very quick, employees are efficient yet amiable, and you save money by doing a little of the job yourself!
I would guess that I've saved $250/month for the last 15 years because I shop at Aldi. Very mustachian!
I am also a Costco member, I like their fresh meats and paper products and stock up about once a month.
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I even prefer Aldi's products compared with premium brand. When I first went there I was taken back because of the $.25 cent cart but it makes sense....no big deal. The only thing I don't like is I can't use credit card and I feel sometimes I'm cheating the system. I can afford shopping some where else but don't. I see some people in there that are suffering or using food stamps and I wonder if I'm messing up the system.
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That's fantastic! I love Aldi's, especially their fruit and veg sales. We just recently became Costco members, and I'm still trying to navigate what is a deal there and what is not.
Let us know how that works out for you. I shop regularly at Aldi and have considered joining Costco, but I'm convinced Costco is actually any cheaper (let alone cheaper enough to be worth it).
As with everything Costco is all about Knowing your prices. I can pay for a membership just in savings on frozen fruit and peanut butter. YMMV.
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So far (and I"ve only been once) I found that over-the-counter, off-brand allergy pills could pay back my membership. Both of my kids are on off brand Claritin, and I bought what amounts to almost a year supply for what I can pay for 3 months at the local store. If I don't renew, I will stock up on that at least. We went on a Saturday, with two small children, it was overwhelming. I think my hubby and I will go on his day off once every 5 weeks or so and not take the kids - we'll be able to think a little clearer that way. It's too far for us (like 15 minutes) to make it my weekly place to get groceries. I'll keep Aldi for that!
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Someone up-thread said the salmon was awful, and I agree. I don't like their canned tuna either. YMMV--most of their food is great, and I've been very pleased. I think that just by going regularly, you learn what works for you and what doesn't. I've figured out by trial and error what to buy where.
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From last week's special here, bought 25g of Italian summer black truffles from Aldi. Not as pungent as the winter or French ones...but at $8, I ain't complaining. The Aussie truffles here are charging $50-100 for the same amount.
Your Aldi stores sell truffles?! Everything in Australia might be "trying to kill you" but at least you get discount truffles! :-)
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Meh. Aldi's is not cheaper for me. The regional grocer I shop at has a ridiculously low markup and, as a result, is often cheaper than Aldi's while having INSANE amount of selection.
I tried shopping at Aldi, but if I go there I can no longer justify driving the other direction to shop at the cheap grocer. So then I'm stuck shopping at pricier stores to get what Aldi's doesn't have. Any and all savings kissed goodbye.
Woodman's? I finally bit the bullet and started shopping there and am saving hundreds/month. There's a Sendik's within 1/2 mile of my house which is easily 2x the cost of Woodman's but the location and produce quality sometimes wins out. Also, I'm learning to figure out Woodman's produce, since a lot of it seems to be of questionable age/storage/etc. I mostly buy staples there since I get most of my meat from a local farmer and a CSA box in the summer.
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From last week's special here, bought 25g of Italian summer black truffles from Aldi. Not as pungent as the winter or French ones...but at $8, I ain't complaining. The Aussie truffles here are charging $50-100 for the same amount.
Your Aldi stores sell truffles?! Everything in Australia might be "trying to kill you" but at least you get discount truffles! :-)
Heh. Happy to eat truffles surrounded by vipers, red backs and drop bears.
Actually Aldi has different types of specials week. Could be bike week, snow week etc. The truffle week also had anchovies, wild rice, saffron and cuttle ink. Some Aldis here also sell liquor - a bottle for the price of a glass. Can't complain.
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Actually Aldi has different types of specials week. Could be bike week, snow week etc. The truffle week also had anchovies, wild rice, saffron and cuttle ink. Some Aldis here also sell liquor - a bottle for the price of a glass. Can't complain.
I love the weekly specials. I bought a pair of steel capped leather work boots, a pair of fleece lined walking boots, and some leather lace up shoes, all for under $30 / pair. Last week I bought an electric tile cutter which works good. The quality of the products seems pretty good.
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Make sure you take your quarter for your cart, bring bags to pack up, and be ready to bag your own groceries. My DH didn't realize this and his first trip to Aldi's annoyed him so much he hasn't gone by himself since. LOL. I love it, though, as long as I'm prepared.
So, for us new guys, we take our own grocery bags/sacks?
Yup.
Also, if no one mentioned it before, they don't take credit cards.
I think it must depend on the Aldi's, mine does take credit cards and I use my debit.
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Meh. Aldi's is not cheaper for me. The regional grocer I shop at has a ridiculously low markup and, as a result, is often cheaper than Aldi's while having INSANE amount of selection.
I tried shopping at Aldi, but if I go there I can no longer justify driving the other direction to shop at the cheap grocer. So then I'm stuck shopping at pricier stores to get what Aldi's doesn't have. Any and all savings kissed goodbye.
Woodman's? I finally bit the bullet and started shopping there and am saving hundreds/month. There's a Sendik's within 1/2 mile of my house which is easily 2x the cost of Woodman's but the location and produce quality sometimes wins out. Also, I'm learning to figure out Woodman's produce, since a lot of it seems to be of questionable age/storage/etc. I mostly buy staples there since I get most of my meat from a local farmer and a CSA box in the summer.
Yup, woodmans. Have never had abnormal issues with their produce. The only thing that's annoying is that they rarely have yellow bananas on the days I go, only green ones that take an unpredictable amount of time to ripen.
Feel free to PM. I don't want to hijack the cult of Aldi thread :P
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I love Aldi, wayy cheaper and they have a great selection. I go there every other week. The Aldi brand of food is solid (except for their mayo, not a fan of their mayo).
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Love Aldi. Favorites are the lowfat vanilla yogurt in the big tub, their red pepper hummus, the pesto, wraps, veggies, fruit, butter lettuces in a bag, organic milk, fresh mozzarella and fresh parm. All cheaper than grocery. I do not buy the meat there and also not a fan of the mayo. Their sweet potato chips are yummy too. And their granola also. Just always have to take cash since I do not have a debit card.
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We love Aldi's. They're particularly good for snack foods, milk and dairy (we don't do the almond milk thing, so I can't weigh in on that topic), eggs, cheese, chicken, and some frozen items -- we often buy the individual chicken breasts and the Gyro kit. Oh, and the little juice bottles my daughter likes to take for her school lunch. And vegetables.
Great big YUCKS for beef in the fresh case, frozen pizzas (Mama something brand -- seriously, we threw away the second one, and we'll eat pretty much anything once we've purchased it).
Their selection is a bit lacking, but for the prices, it's a very worthwhile stop!
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aldi takes mastercard
https://www.aldi.ie/en/about-aldi/information/credit-card-in-store/
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And they pay their employees well. I live in Iowa, very low cost of living, and last time I was there they had a help wanted flyer on the door. They were hiring full time cashiers for $12.50/h and team leads for $16.50/h. Minimum wage is $7.25/h. So that's pretty darn decent starting pay for unskilled workers!
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aldi takes mastercard
Not in the US. Cash or debit cards only.
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And they pay their employees well. I live in Iowa, very low cost of living, and last time I was there they had a help wanted flyer on the door. They were hiring full time cashiers for $12.50/h and team leads for $16.50/h. Minimum wage is $7.25/h. So that's pretty darn decent starting pay for unskilled workers!
They pay their workers well, and their workers work efficiently for it. The cashier doesn't sit and play Angry Birds/Flappy Bird/Candy Crush/whatever when nobody is at the checkout. They'll be stocking or cleaning or something. Beats the hell out of other grocery stores where you'll see five cashiers and five baggers twiddling their thumbs while nobody is at the checkout. It's still cheaper to hire one $12.50/hr employee than half a dozen $8/hr zombies.
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Aldi is our go-to for avocados, sweet potatoes, cheese, maraschino cherries, english muffins, and a few other odds and ends. The one here is right across the street from another grocery chain, so it's easy enough to pop into both on the same shopping trip and just buy whatever's cheaper in each store.
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Heh. Happy to eat truffles surrounded by vipers, red backs and drop bears.
Actually Aldi has different types of specials week. Could be bike week, snow week etc. The truffle week also had anchovies, wild rice, saffron and cuttle ink. Some Aldis here also sell liquor - a bottle for the price of a glass. Can't complain.
But the big question: is there an Aldi brand vegemite? :-)
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I'm a big fan of Aldi's and, and also am a fan of the concept of no-thrills but low prices. For instance, a friend of mine is running the Monocqua No Frills marathon, which costs $35, which is insanely cheap. It does this by keeping everything simple and focusing moreso on the actual race.
The concept is similar for Aldi's, rather than paying people to bring the carts in, they instead require a 25 cent deposit to check it out, which lowers their overhead and enables them to keep their prices down. Same goes for bagging, which I am glad for the incentive as it is a reminder to keep a bag in my car for any groceries.
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It took me a year to figure out the whole shopping thing when i took it over from my wife BUT with 90% of our groceries coming from Aldis i have knocked our grocery bill for a family of 6 into a third of what it was.
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I am falling in love with Aldi! I have two that are close to my home and it beats the heck out of our "normal" grocery store. I need to try Woodman's though, and Costco -- but both of them require serious driving to get to and from. I might be better off staying close to home and/or using coupons.
I pretend I am in Europe when I go to Aldi, by the way.
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I'm a big fan of Aldi. They should pay my wife for the free marketing she does. She originally said she was looking forward to moving back to Iowa to get back to Hy-Vee. I told her we should try out Aldi and she saids he liked the "experience" of Hy-Vee. In college, when she shopped there routinely, she wasn't paying her bills. It's funny how, even when she wasn't trying to "live it up" on her parents' dime, Aldi becomes so attractive. We do pretty much all of our grocery shopping there. The exception will be if we need a specific kind of produce - big grocery stores have good options year round. At Aldi you definitely have to buy based on what is in season.
Man I miss HyVee. Not the message you were going for, I know :).
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Good for you! Perhaps the most important part of this post is the team work developing with the wife!
Leverage this my friend.
In my experience after living in a town with both an aldis and Walmart supper center is that I never ventured into an Aldis after the first few tries. Their selection was very limited where I live so I might find one or two items cheaper than wally world. It just wasn't worth the savings.
Here is a couple of hints to keep your Paleo like diet in the way below $400 range.
Shop at walmart at Monday morning around 6:30 a.m.. Their meat cuts are tagged for discount if they didn't sell on the weekend.
Use loss leaders to your advantage. (if the drive is on your way or nearbye). We usually buy our paleo eggs for $1 a dozen and buy 15 dozen at a time when they hit sale price.
Last week a local HyVee store featured 1 pound rolls of 80/20 ground beef for $2. I bought 30 pounds. Roll with the loss leaders!
I'm pretty paleo so I just pop in walmart twice a week for the veggies.
Potatoes can be had for $1 for 5 pounds many times as a loss leader.
I go with frozen veggies when ever possible. (never ever canned). Lots of stores will feature 1 pound bags of frozen veggies for 1 - 1.5.
Remember, Walmart will match competitors prices on anything. No ad or proof is needed if it is less than a 50% mark down.
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I remember Aldi from when I was a kid and I feel like the quality wasn't as good back then... maybe it was just being a kid and wanting name brand snacks.
I miss Winco in California...
In Illinois I was on Wal-Mart only partly for convenience of 24 hours, but when my work schedule normalized, I started checking out Aldi. I'm a convert, I love Aldi and tell everyone. It's definitely been trial and error like someone upthread said, but I feel like the more we shop there, the more we get at Aldi instead of having to make a different trip to Wal-Mart.
The only things we have to get at Wal-Mart now are Almond Milk (haven't seen it at our Aldi, but sometimes I think things are hiding) and coffee. We tried their brand, but get whichever is cheaper of folgers/maxwell at WM or the even closer store Shop N Save.
CSA has ended for us so I'm not sure what that will mean for produce shopping... we are the last 2 workers to still get our shares so we've still been working for veggies a couple of weeks after the paid shares are over. Then again we will most likely be moving in a month or so... oh no, we'll have to learn a new grocery store layout!
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Aldi is my main grocery store; I'll pick up a few loss leaders at Tops, and a very few items that are cheaper at SaveALot when I'm nearby, but 90% is from Aldi.
Which store carries the cheapest stuff must depend on region. I keep hearing about Wal-Mart and Target for groceries, but I've found them to be very high whenever I'm in an area where I can shop in those two. Our Aldi matches nearby competitor's prices on items like milk and eggs. I've noticed the differences in those prices by town, and cashiers told me it is all about the local competition.
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Has anyone in Texas compared the prices of Aldi to HEB? Also, no credit card but they do allow debit card purchases... so that is cool.
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I am falling in love with Aldi! I have two that are close to my home and it beats the heck out of our "normal" grocery store. I need to try Woodman's though, and Costco -- but both of them require serious driving to get to and from. I might be better off staying close to home and/or using coupons.
I pretend I am in Europe when I go to Aldi, by the way.
I used to shop Festival/Copps and then tried Woodman's. Was floored by the price difference. Recently tried Aldi and they definitely have their good options too (this week was fresh mushrooms or 3lb bag of onions for $0.49 each - wow!).
Woodman's definitely has better selection, but the store is big and it can take time to get thru. Aldi is much quicker and a good stop for mid-week staples (milk, bread, fruit).
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I can't believe the price difference when you pay more attention.
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Aldis take n bake pizzas are the best
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Whenever I'm at Aldi, my kids get complimented on their behavior. I think it's because we are only there for 20 minutes due to the size of the store. Ha! Or my alternate theory, Aldi customers are super nice.
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I love Aldi for two reasons:
1. There food is awesome (even the produce which you have to buy seasonally)
2. They have excellent store segmentation strategies. The store near my place is heavily hispanic foods (which I love), but the one out in the burbs has more fancy dairy products.
However, loss leaders around these parts at normal grocery chains blow, so its almost not even a fair comparison. When I lived in Minneapolis, Wal-Mart decided it was going to compete with Aldi on price, so for an entire summer we were getting eggs for $.79 a dozen and milk for $2.29
I don't have time to got to many grocery stores, and I don't coupon except on consumables which I buy at Target
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Double Money Back Guarantee at Aldi.
My unexpired swiss cheese I opened had mold.
Returned it to store without receipt. They replaced cheese AND refunded my money.
How about that for customer service?
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I normally shop in Aldi's in Kansas but on a trip to my parents in Maryland I stopped to pick up some groceries at Safeway. I had sticker shock on almost everything I bought...about double the price! Then I took my Mom to Aldi's and I expected that the prices would be higher as well because of the location. Everything we bought was comparable to Kansas. I was surprised that they didn't have some mark up. I'm taking the receipt home with me to see if the prices are the same. I'm impressed!
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Our local Aldi was clearing out 8oz bags of chopped walnuts. Marked down to $0.99/bag! I quickly grabbed 6 bags and danced through the rest of the aisles over the find. Definitely keep a lookout for the yellow tags with hand-drawn prices.
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Our Aldi recently closed for a one month expansion/renovation. Right before they did so, they had tons of things on clearance. I was buying cans of green chilis for 25 cents a piece, blocks of cheese for a dollar or less, etc. etc. It was awesome! Now that the new store is up and running, I see less of this, but still in general, if you keep an eye out, you can usually get things that are marked down.
We recently have been buying their brie cheese and prosciutto, and they are both good quality.