About a year or two ago, I made a comprehensive list of common household items I buy and made a chart on price per unit for each store location in my area (comparing Aldi, Walmart, Meijer, and Kroger). From cheapest to most expensive, it came down to Aldi being cheapest, Walmart, Meijer then Kroger being most expensive in general. Some items were cheaper at the more expensive stores, but I figured I'd get the most bang for my buck by getting most of my groceries at Aldi, then swinging by Walmart to get anything else I couldn't get at Aldi. In the beginning I'd browse ads for each store to see if the sale prices were better than normal, but overtime most advertised items weren't better than Aldi prices (at best Meijer had the best price on seasonal produce but not much else).
However, this weekend I was browsing around Kroger, which I hadn't visited in a long time, and discovered that their store brand cottage cheese and peanut butter was so much cheaper than Aldi, and I go through A LOT of cottage cheese and peanut butter in a month! I assume this is a recent change because my notes from a couple years prior doesn't note them being cheap at Kroger (I think Kroger is expanding their in house products in recent years?). For reference Aldi sells 24oz cottage cheese for $2.20, Kroger 24oz for $1.89. Aldi natural peanut butter is $3.50 for 15oz and Kroger natural peanut butter 15oz is $1.70 (HALF OFF!!? These aren't even sale prices either)! I feel silly for not comparing prices more often, so check your stores at least twice a year. I'm going to make rounds to my store today to check prices again!
February 18, 2018 at 11:15AM
