ALDI THREAD - Hate, rate, debate, masturbate. Are they improving

Good when I need a bag of chips or some crackers. Terrible when I want anything else.

Its basically convenience store quality food but they don't sell beer unlike 7/11.

>>7280650
I've heard they're good. Pretty much condensing down to the staples on a corporate level to cut down on prices.

Never been there tho. Also heard you gotta put a deposit in to get a cart, so there are no stalls in the lot.

>>7280650
NEET general

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>tfw cheese puffs sold out within a day again

In So Cal here. Am anxiously waiting on the Aldi stores they announced about last Summer. .___.

>>7280678
>no experience with the subject of the thread
>contributes literally nothing

gr8 post, m8

It sucks.

They're kinda shit. Some things are cheaper and less shit, but everything else is shit

>>7280692
they don't sell Doritos® and Mountain Dew® in Aldi

any aldi outside of europe is trash and needs to be shut down

>>7280740
From my uninformed, inexperienced, yet contrarian opinion...

You're wrong.

>>7280676
some of the aldi near me sell cheap beer and wine

What should I get at Aldi? There's one a ways up the street, never been before. I hear it's cheap, which is good, because I need to make my $198 in food stamps stretch.

>>7280678
here in england you have to put a pound inside a trolley to unlock it for use. this is the same at every shop.

Learn how to pick out produce, because it's going to be a crapshoot there otherwise. I get their avocados a lot. The lemons and limes are solid. The plastic boxes of greens are okay, but choose wisely. Some days you can tell it's been sitting around too long. Apples, peppers, grape tomatoes are all a safe bet. I get chicken breast and sometimes pork there. Most of their cheeses are good. The hummus is okay. Milk and eggs are good. Their spices are crappy and limited, but cheap. Most of the canned stuff is worth picking up. Their European imports are usually quite good. Pasta. A couple of their specialty breads are awesome (there's this large "tuscan" loaf that I really like). Oatmeal, rice, dried beans, flour and shit like that. I'd probably avoid most of the freezer section, especially the premade and processed stuff. The frozen shrimp and salmon are fine, if you're into that sort of thing.

I use to love them
But lately their prices has gone up and size of their products has shrunk

>>7280773
>I'd probably avoid most of the freezer section, especially the premade and processed stuff.

Their chicken wings are the best in the biz tho

Great place to buy condiments and canned food in bulk, but everything else is sorta... meh.
It sucks that theres no bags for your groceries except the shitty ones they sell, or what boxes you can scavenge off the shelves, and that they always have 1 less register open than they need, no matter how busy they are.
Its worse than a fucking walmart.

>>7280770
Sheffield, UK Tesco's don't require this. I was amazed when I moved to Sheffield. Most just have a bulky thing on one wheel that's supposed to lock up if you take it off site.

>>7280650
Its good to check out occasionally, but one can never go to Aldi with something specific in mind because the stuff they get is so random sometimes.

I would avoid produce and meat. Their wrapping and cleanliness standards are usually sub-par.

Do stock up on chocolate or snacks. You simply will not find a better intersection on price and quality on chocolate in America.

>>7280650
I used to work for these cunts, worst working atmosphere. I like their banana lollies though I stole so many packets.

An Aldi popped up in my town and it was just three long aisles with all boxed shit. They didn't have any meat or produce.

>>7280955

Is Aldi America meat bad? I've found Australian Aldi meat to be better than most supermarkets.

>>7281016
I don't think it's dangerous or anything, but a lot of the meat seems to be of pretty low quality. Some of it seems just fine. The poultry is quite good, but I've had some of their beef and pork that has been pretty bad. Every once in a while I'll pick something up if it look okay, but I don't really go to Aldi for meat (except chicken and turkey).

>>7281016
Why are you buying meat at the supermarket in Australia? If you've got access to an Aldi, you've got access to a butcher. Lower prices, better quality.

And Aldi meat is no better than Woolworths or Coles.

>>7280776
> illiterate confirmed
Package size has shrunk but the amounts within have stayed the same. Try reading some time.

>>7280676
I want to know where you live where 7/11 sells imported sausages and PDO cheeses.

>>7280743
Some stuff is bad. Some stuff is good. This is no different than any other store, ever. The chocolates are good. The potatoes and onions, for some reason, rot muh more quickly than their non-Aldi counterparts.

>>7280752
What other Aldi locations have you been to? I've only been to Aldi in Germany, Switzerland and the US and they all seem to be pretty good.

>>7280768
Rice and beans. The pork is of surprisingly good quality. The chicken is average. I've not liked the beef I've gotten at Aldi.
Pantry staples are also a good idea, such as flour, sugar, cooking oil, pasta and the like, as are fridge staples like milk, eggs and butter.

>>7280773
>spices are crappy
Coming from a paprika-eating culture, Aldi's paprika is surprisingly good for the price. Not as good as Pride of Szeged, but it's like 8,5/10 v PoS' 9/10 at a quarter the price.

>>7280903
Their frozen chicken in general is good. At 95¢/lb, I can spend $15 and get enough meat for a around thirty servings, bones enough for a litre of stock and enough skin and fat to render nearly three cups of chicken grease and leave delicious chicken rinds for munching.

>>7280955
But the meat and produce is packaged and shipped in from elsewhere and is not packaged in store. Have you ever even been to Aldi?

>>7281016
The pork is good. The chicken is average. The beef is meh. The lamb is good. The duck is good. I've never had their turkey.

>>7280752
>>7281371
Sadly in US, Aldi quality really depends on the location. Lower income areas tend to staff with those people and they run stores like shit. Customers wreck the place and employees can be from the same stock.

I work at one of the two best Aldi in my region and have gone to other stores....never will I do so again. Parents let their kids run around and wreck shit without saying a word and they are no better as adults usually. It's a tragic look at the cycle of ignorance and self destruction. So if you see people saying Aldi is shit they are probably shit people shopping in a shit area with other shit people running the place. It's really quite sad. Go to an Aldi run by middle class American stock and it's always quality.

>>7280650
I use them to buy staple foods for my pantry: Canned soups, Sugar, Flour, and there are a few tea biscuit like things there that the wife likes.

They're pretty shit for anything else.

>>7281484
That's strange....at my local Aldi they sell the exact same produce that gets sold for twice as much over at Whole Foods.....same packaging and everything.

>>7281494
Everything at Whole Foods is supposed to be organic. Nothing I see at Aldi's is labeled as such. and to top it off, I've seen fruit flies in teh produce section.

I don't really look too closely though, since the bugs kind of soured me on it. Between my garden and CSA I rarely shop for produce anyways, and I get most of my meat from an independent butcher. I'm trying to think of anything we get there other than what I mentioned. Spaetzel?

>>7281503
>Everything at Whole Foods is supposed to be organic
lol

not much of a whole foods shopper are we

>>7281468
The majority of people who shop at my nearest Aldi are, like me, middle class immigrants. The workers are mostly the kids of middle class people and the managers are a pair of dykes who don't fucking play when it comes to getting shit done.
It's clean, well-stocked and, with the exception of the potatoes and onions, the produce is good and fresh.
Though the tills have rather long queues, they workers breeze through it with unmatched speed. If the till girl has ten people in her lane, she'll get through them all faster than one at a regular supermarket would get through three people.

>>7281494
Mine, too. Other than the potatoes, onions and fruits, it's all Tanimura and Antle. The organic stuff is particularly cheap. Organic arugula/rocket is $2.49 for a 5oz clamshell while it would cost $5.99 at WF.

>>7281510
I really am not. I just can't stand all of the anti-science bullshit that their average customer spouts. Whole Foods was founded on the hippy notion that pesticides are bad. Where they are not fully organic, they purport to use "responsibly grown" produce. This is evidenced by their own website:
http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/responsibly-grown/purpose-why-it-matters

Now, as a resident of the Midwest that grew up around my grandparents' farms, and who tries hard to provide a good portion of my food from my own land, I do have an interest in sustainable/regenerative agriculture. But science can work hand in hand with those practices to accomplish more.

And maybe the company is embracing the principles I espouse. The nearest one is 40 minutes from here, and my trips inside saw high prices, patchouli reeking hipsters, and a lot of what I perceived as trendy bullshit.

I guess I'm just not into paying extra for stuff like that, when there's tons of small farmers and farmers markets to shop at here in my little mid-west college town.

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>>7281548
>all this because of a fucking grocery chain
tell us how you feel about the cool starbucks hipsters, m'lord. does it upset you when they ostantatiously sip their cool french vanilla mocha-lattes while wearing cutting edge fashion like the new ugg boots and the provocatively cool black glasses that have taken the jet set by storm?

>>7281503
>hurr durr nothing at aldi is organic and it's filled with flies!!!
Confirmed for having never, not even once, set foot inside an Aldi.
Half the fucking store is organic and the place is cleaner than Mormon comedy.

Maybe what >>7281468 says is true and your Aldi is shitty because it reflects its locals ergo, you're a shitty person.

I suspect he's wrong, though, because even the Aldis in the nigger-infested areas of town are clean, well-stocked and filled with organic things.

I think you've just never been to one.

>>7281577
guy who is giving that guy shit for his attitudes about WF here

I've only been to one aldi in my life but it was easily in the top 3 most depressing awful grocery stores I've been to. everything freezer burned, dented cans, the most fucked up packaged food, no produce that I can recall, not even onions.

granted this was maybe 15 years ago, they could have cleaned up their act by now. but I have no intention of ever going inside one again.

>>7281566
The Starbucks is next to the Chipotle across the street from the college. I never go there, so have no opinion. As a proper townie, I frequent the coffee shop/used bookstore downtown that I've been going to for 27 years.

>>7281577
Maybe my Aldi's have all been shitty. I expect them to be of the 3 I've been to in Omaha, Toledo, and my own town, all 3 were in shitty parts of town. Aldi's is low-income shopping, and I expect no less. Basically, the reasons I don't buy more than a few items in Aldi's is the same reason I don't shop at Walmart. I can't stand the people I see there, and the savings are just not good enough for me to justify a decrease in quality. I'll stick to Costco, Kroger, and Meijer's for the things I need that can not be sourced from local growers or my butcher.

I'm sorry that I do not share your love of WF and/or Aldi's. Have you considered that both of us have been shaped by independent experiences and might not have formed the same views?

green bay WI, US of A here, and let me say. We have two Aldis, i remember shopping at the good one when i was a pre-teen, all i can say about that is that it kept me alive, parents would buy snacks, dairy and some produce but never meat. Now that im mid 20's i never shop there and the gf says to stay away from the meat, she must of had a bad experience. We went in one day as a joke and bought some produce and a box of snickers ice cream bars, was surprised at the chocolate section, imported hazelnut bars and such, mmmm i do have a sweet tooth. so other than whats said, my opinion of he place is its a mental institution/ugly ppl central.

>>7281590
>>7281603
I don't shop at Wal•Mart because the prices for things they carry that I actually buy are total shit.

They're cheap for ready meals and other convenience foods. While I like those things from time to time (frozen pot pies are the shiznit), I don't buy them often enough to warrant shopping there regularly.

Perhaps it's because I don't buy a lot of junk food or ready meals that I think so highly of Aldi. I've tried a handful of their ready meals and have been greatly disappointed each time. However! Each of the five Aldi stores in my general area are always well-stocked and clean. They all carry a huge number of organic goods. And I don't recall ever seeing flies in any of them.

Two are in white, middle class areas, one is in a mixed Hispanic, white and Asian area and the other two are in poor black areas and none have been anywhere near as bad as described ITT.
Save-A-Lot and Murray's are exactly like that, though. Fruit flies, nothing organic, off smells, inattentive staff, slow tills and horrible customer-base. Especially Murray's. Fuck Murray's.

>>7281620
>Perhaps it's because I don't buy a lot of junk food or ready meals that I think so highly of Aldi
But that's literally all they have
>However!
Please punch yourself in the throat kthxbai XD XD

>>7281620
And my experience at Aldi's is that it's a hit or miss selection. The produce is nowhere near as good as I'll get at the farmer's market, or Meijer's, which is based close enough to here to buy from local growers anyways, and the meat is prepackaged crap that I'd be insane to buy, with a meat packing plant and 2 very good butchers in town. Since the costco opened, I even buy my staples there. The only things I have from Aldi's in the pantry right now is a flat of cream of mushroom soup, because I'm a midwesterner born in the 70's, and cream soup casseroles remind me of my mother's cooking, and a half flat each of cream style and golden sweet canned corn that we keep around for a 20 minute sausage, potato and corn chowder we make when we don't have time to cook.

Our Aldi's apparently are different. i will say that they make the most badass canvas shopping bags I've seen. The 2 massive bags I got from there will accommodate even my most extreme shopping trips, and the riveted handle straps mean it should hold up for a hell of a long time.

I like it, since I'm a poor student. I don't like getting fresh fruit and vegetables or meat from there though since I'm very particular about them and I don't think the quality is great. Buying their chicken actually made me switch to buying the Quorn shit instead because it put me off so much.

Oh, and their lemon cheesecake is literally the best cheesecake I've ever bought from a shop.

>>7281625
You are wrong and gay.

>>7281641
As said, mine stocks Tanimura and Antle produce, which is very good quality. The only homebrand produce they sell are potatoes and onions, both of which are shit so I won't buy it.

Mostly, I buy PDO cheese, pantry staples, dairy, eggs and whatever's knocked down to manager's special, which is how I try out some of the ready meals and stuff. I tried one of their canned soups once. Once was quite enough. Never again.

But yeah, it must be heavily regional since the once around here are all pretty damned good.

>>7281714
>once around here
Um.
>ones around here

>>7280650
I won't go into Aldi anymore. I find the shopping experience very unsatisfying, much like Trader Joe's, which is set up in a similar way. The focus of the store is snack and convenience foods. I don't but that shit. I'm looking for basic ingredients that I can bring home and make into meals. Aldi kind of sucks for that.

They just opened the first Aldi in NYC, I haven't gone there yet and I don't know what they have, but it's near my apartment.

What is this store good for?

>>7281815
Frozen vegetables grown in chinese cadmium fields, scary freezer burned mystery meat, dented leaky cans of off-brand pork & beans, pretty much probably (?) nontoxic real olive-like machine oil (collected directly from the grease-dripping mafia docks of lampedusa!), and guilt-free nonfat non-dairy house-brand ice cream bars that have been melted and refrozen at least five times.

Friendly reminder that Aldi doesn't advertise which implies that they are successful enough now in for opposing companies to spend money on this online smear campaign. Apparently they forgot that any publicity is good publicity.

>>7281875
>Aldi doesn't advertise
Selling cheap food to poor people is pretty much a lock.

>>7281875
Aldi advertises plenty you mongoloid. They send a salesflyer to my house every god damn week.

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Anyone in the UK tried their Salame and rocket pizza?
For a frozen pizza its fucking godlike.

I love the blue corn tortilla chips and Specially Selected vanilla ice cream.

>>7281617
>mental institution/ugly ppl central
You already said it was in Green Bay bro, no need to be redundant.