Let’s Go Shopping, Aldi Style…

During the Mom 2 Summit, I had the chance to participate in a field trip with one of the sponsors, Aldi.

Aldi store in Westchester, FL

If you have an Aldi in your town, lucky you!  Aldi, recognized as the nation’s low-price grocery leader,  is an international grocer in Europe and Australia, now taking the US by storm.  We don’t have an Aldi nearby, but being a geeky kind of marketer, I couldn’t resist getting a tour and having someone talk me through a store planogram.

We had a chance to tour the store with Liz, their head of PR, and Allison, from the brand’s PR agency.  We were met by two regional representatives who showed us around.

We learned a lot of things about Aldi.  First off, they carry very few “name” brands in their stores.  The majority of their products are under Aldi exclusive store brands.  For a marketer like me, it took some getting used to.  The packaging was close to the name brands, but just off enough to make me pause.

Store brands are just one way that Aldi keeps their prices low.  Products are stored in pallet containers, eliminating the need for staff to have to shelve it.

The product inside the packaging is what was most surprising.  We’re not talking low end, poor quality.  Everything we tasted was comparable to the name brand products, except they were much lower priced.

Sometimes, Aldi can’t find a product that they can private label and have it compete with the name brands.  That’s why they carry Pringles.  They’ve tried to find a generic version, but haven’t been able to.  Yet.

Other times, they may face shortages of Aldi store brands, so they bring in other products to make sure customers can get what they need.  Hence Betty Crocker side by side with the same Aldi products.

The bloggers with me had a great time stocking up on some Aldi products to hold us through the hunger-inducing excitement of Mom 2.  Did I mention that Aldi in Florida also sells wine?  And sangria!

Disclosure: I was invited by Aldi to particpate in this store tour.  I received several Aldi products and a gift certificate, but my opinions are my own and I was not asked to blog about this experience.