Friday, October 10, 2008

Aldi History - How the Cheap Grocery Store Came About

To get things started I want to give you a little lesson on the history of the Aldi grocery chain. It all started in the western German city of Essen. In 1913 the mother of Theo and Karl Albrecht opened up a small mom and pop grocery store. After WW II the sons took over and expanded their business. The name Aldi is a contraction of their last name and the word discount (ALbrecht-DIscount).
By 1950 the already owned 13 stores in Germany. In 1960, the brothers split up their business into Aldi South and North. By that time they owned about 300 Stores. Over the years they kept expanding and today they own about 7000 stores in Europe as well as 1000 in Australia and the US. The US, with its roughly 800 stores is actually part of the Aldi South branch of the company. They have been here since 1976. Germany is still the heart of the operation.
The key to success with the store is its uniformity. You can find the same set of products in the same spot all over the world. The owners cut out all the fancy decorations and waste no money on presentation. Just look at the tiles in the stores, they are the same all over the world. I bet they get a good deal at the tile maker. They also keep the store square footage rather small, not like the Walmarts of this day and age. By the way, Walmart is able to sell stuff for cheap due to the same principal Aldi adheres to. They also run their logistics very efficient and keep their employees in line. Aldi's product lines are small, and they have a lot of unique store brand products. Hence this blog.
Aldi may not be the fanciest place to shop at, but their prices for quality products are hard to beat. So I hope you enjoy this blog, in which I try to tell you about the great products, and the ones you really should stay away from.

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