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I have been shopping regularly at ALDI since 2004, when a store opened nearby, but I have been familiar with their no frills, great value stores since I was a little girl. I have a large extended family in Germany, from where ALDI originates, and whenever we were visiting our relatives a trip to ALDI was de rigueur. Coming home, our suitcases were crammed to the brim with bargains from ALDI!

ALDI sells all sorts of fantastically well priced items quite aside from foodstuffs, including electrical items, art and craft accessories, gardening products, clothing and toys. I have bought many items of clothing from ALDI and they have all been well made, easy to wash and hard wearing. Although there is nowhere to try clothes on in store, refunds are not a problem if you change your mind once you get your purchase home. As for toys, the Tonka refuse truck that Santa Claus brought my son for Christmas came from ALDI too, and it is his absolute favorite toy and yet a long shot away from being the most expensive.

ALDI work hard to keep their running costs low. Their warehouse style stores are stacked with goods, and customers are encouraged to bring their own bags. If you forget, you can buy bags at the till, but it is cheaper and much more environmentally friendly to bring your own. ALDI have a deposit scheme for trolleys, which is not unusual in the UK, but quite new in the American and Australian markets. Basically you put your pound or quarter in the cart, do your shopping and then return it for your refund. This saves ALDI having to employ someone to collect trolleys for them. The staff that do work for ALDI are all multi-taskers, and can often be seen dashing around replenishing stock, when they are not needed on the tills. ALDI pays a better rate than many supermarkets for this, but they also don't need to employ so many people. Their cost effective attitude means that savings can be passed on to their customers.

In the UK, ALDI sells an excellent selection of fresh fruit and vegetables at remarkably good prices. Locally sourced produce is well represented and there are amazing bargains to be found. Last week I paid 19p (about 10 cents) for a carton of delicious, baby cherry tomatoes. They also have an excellent range of breads and cakes, many of which are also made locally. Unsurprisingly, speciality German foods are easily available, and many of these are delicious. This Christmas we enjoyed Stollen cake and a box of my favorite Neideregger marzipan from ALDI.

My absolute can't live without top buys at ALDI include Carlini extra virgin olive oil, Specially Selected Parmigiano Reggiano Parmesan cheese, Dairyfine milk chocolate and Glen Marnoch single malt whisky. My one complaint about ALDI is down to what they don't sell rather than what they do. As I cater for a predominantly vegetarian household, I am a big fan of quorn products. This is the one thing I have to shop elsewhere for, but I'm hopeful that this might change in the future.

All in all, my experience of ALDI leads me to recommend it very highly. I realize that in many respects factors such as readily available, high quality local produce are dependent on where in the world you live, but my store certainly has a good mix of both local and foreign speciality foods. The staff are all bright and friendly, the products are excellent, and I come home with plenty of change left in my pocket too!

Learn more about this author, Michelle Strozykowski.
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