NEW ADVERTS ON YOU TUBE

Just love these! LL

Aw, they're wonderful, LL! Good finds!

bb1 wrote:Aw, they're wonderful, LL! Good finds!

I'll go see if there are more of them. Don't go away .... LL

I agree with comments above written.

So cute.

Grumpy Cat is wonderful.

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Incidentally, I see those prices are in $ - I didn't know Aldi had spread to the States. Scrub that, I've just seen the bit under the ad, I think they're Aussie dollars. Mind you, I didn't know it was in Oz, either....

Neither did I, Bonny.

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Thanks, Lily, that's interesting. Their food is good quality, though you can't really compare prices because the US doesn't have to import so much fresh fruit and veg, for instance.

I agree with you, Bonny.

I found this WSJ article from 2013!

Aldi to Boost Its Number of U.S. Stores by 50%
By ANNIE GASPARRO
Updated Dec. 20, 2013 12:10 a.m. ET
Aldi Inc. plans to open 50% more stores in the U.S. over the next five years, seeking to become the country's biggest discount supermarket chain by store count.

The company's target shows how grocers at the high and low ends of the market have continued to grow while those in the middle have struggled.

Aldi, which is based in Germany, has nearly 1,300 U.S. locations, mostly in the Midwest and East.

The chain has prospered in recent years by selling low-cost food and other grocery items, mostly under its own labels, in clean, uncluttered stores, an approach that has appealed to economically pinched consumers.

Aldi's many private-label brands include Simply Nature potato chips, Tuscan Garden salad dressings and Fit&Active protein bars.

The retailer is expected to announce Friday that it will open 650 new stores in the U.S. by 2018, and will venture into new markets, such as Southern California. That could allow it to surpass the store count of rival Save-A-Lot, a unit of Supervalu Inc., which had 1,334 locations as of last month and has expanded little in recent years.

"We are ramping up expansion because there is growing demand for our stores," Aldi US President Jason Hart said in an interview.

Closely held Aldi is one of the two distinct arms of the supermarket empire founded by Germany's Albrecht brothers. The other arm owns the Trader Joe's grocery chain.

Aldi opened its first store in the U.S. in 1976, and in recent years has been opening about 80 stores annually in the country. The new expansion plan would accelerate that pace to an average of 130 store openings a year.

Aldi bucks many traditional supermarket practices. It requires a 25-cent deposit for grocery carts so it doesn't have to pay workers to return carts.

The chain also carries mostly store-branded goods, rather than name brands, to help keep costs low. Its stores lack the elaborate displays found in typical grocery stores. Instead, it stocks crates of groceries directly on its shelves and dots its aisles with pallets of boxed products.

"That way, our customers aren't paying for someone to stack each jar of peanut butter on top of each other and turn the labels just right," said Mr. Hart.

Aldi also stocks a smaller variety of products that most chains, which Mr. Hart said lets it focus on increasing order volume—and thereby reducing costs—in the products it does carry.

Jim Hertel, a grocery industry analyst at Willard Bishop, said discount, limited-assortment stores like Aldi have attracted cost-conscious consumers, who tend to stick with those retailers even after their financial situation improves.

"There is a lot of potential in that category that hasn't been realized," he said.

Willard Bishop estimates that Aldi, which doesn't publish its financial results, has same-store sales growth of about 8%.

In October Supervalu said that Save-A-Lot's same-store sales fell slightly in the latest quarter.

One of my favorite grocery stores is Trader Joe's.  I have been going to them since they first opened in S. Cal.  They were started in Pasadena but I see that they are now owned by the German company who own Aldi.  Never knew that they sold out.

Aldi bucks many traditional supermarket practices. It requires a 25-cent deposit for grocery carts so it doesn't have to pay workers to return carts.

That's common in the UK. But it's a pound coin.

Aldi here is my most favorite store as they have loads of Austrian and Germany foods, only a 20 minute drive to the nearest one. Much prefer it to Tescos. I do miss Morrisons and Waitrose, though. LL

Loads of people here are too lazy to return their carts to bays in the parking lots. I do.
I know about using a one pound coin in the UK, Bonny, but it's new here.

We actually had an offshoot of Tescos in S. Cal near where I lived. I used to shop there too. It was rather limited but had some good points.

Sorry, this is a long article about why it failed.

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Fresh & Easy's cost-saving business model of using only self-service checkout aisles was a hard sell with some customers who missed the ease of having checkers ring up their purchases.

You need go no further than that, Lily. I used a Tesco self-service checkout once, and never again. I suspect that may be one of the 'issues' that is currently hurting Tesco in the UK.

If you have to do everything yourself and that is reflected in the prices - fair enough, that's your choice.

But if you are in a full-price store and STILL have to do everything yourself - b*gger that for a game of soldiers. They are also a nightmare for the elderly, who really don't like being bleeped at, and often need a hand with packing, etc.

And every time the damned thing sees something it doesn't like or recognise, it needs a human to sort it out anyway. Which means standing in a queue waiting for a free human to sort it out....

Exactly, Bonny. It's almost the store equivalent of phone calls with all those automated menus and no human on hand.

Automation is hardly the Holy Grail. Who doesn't like the human touch?

It's almost the store equivalent of phone calls with all those automated menus and no human on hand.

I confess, I have been known to find myself yelling at the disembodied voice, Oh, SHUT UP! If I could sort it out myself on your goddam website, I would. I'm phoning you BECAUSE I NEED TO SPEAK TO A HUMAN!

I understand totally, Bonny.

Only this week I have clocked up heaven knows how many hours going in circles when I needed a human.