Slate's Culture Blog Dec. 2 2013 12:26 PM
Chances are that you have never set foot inside the best grocery store in America: Aldi. And even if you are lucky enough to be in one of the 32 states where Aldi is, perhaps you were put-off by the cardboard boxes in lieu of shelves, or the row upon row of suspicious-looking off-brands. What
is this place? Why do I have to put down a deposit to check out a cart?
What is the weird giant shelf by the exit? And what do you mean, I have
to pay for a bag?
Calm your hormones, meine Schatzis: Aldi, which is short for Albrecht Discount, is the American incarnation of a German grocery chain that is so ubiquitous in the Vaterland that almost 90 percent of Germans shop there. (Not all German imports are luxury cars, beer, and super-cool glasses.)
The Brüder founded their discount-store empire
together. A disagreement in 1960 over selling cigarettes hastened a
partition, and an epic game of grocery-store Risk: Theo would rename his
business Aldi Nord, and would control territories north of the Rhine, plus a healthy chunk of Europe. Karl would head up Aldi Süd, and get southern Germany, more of Europe, plus the U.K. and Ireland. But both companies operate stores in the United States—Aldi Süd operates as Aldi, and Aldi Nord as the now ubiquitous Trader Joe’s.
But whereas Trader Joe’s employs just one major cost-saving device—private labeling—everything
else about it is Americanized. The place is swarming with upbeat
employees; cashiers stand at the till and bag your products for you; you
just grab a cart willy-nilly and they trust you to put it back. Aldi
also private-labels (those $1.99 “Millville” Rice Squares are Chex, you guys!), but what makes it a more exciting venture—and even cheaper than Trader Joe’s—is that it has imported the entire German grocery experience (aside, alas, from employees yelling at you if you do something wrong).
If you’ve ever visited Germany, you’ve noticed that a
4-ounce glass of juice at a restaurant may run you $10, while
groceries—often of much higher quality than their American
counterparts—will be noticeably less expensive. This is in part because of cost-cutting shopping practices whose arrival stateside I greet with a robust “Wunderbar!”
You can always tell an American in Germany by the way they incredulously don’t get that nobody is going to bag their groceries for them—they’re expected to do so (and schnell!)
while the seated cashier is ringing them up. Shoppers also have the
option of quickly sticking wares back into the cart and schlepping them
over to a special low, wide shelf that’s an official bagging area. As
for the cart: It requires a deposit, and customers must return them to
their rightful place—without the help of an employee—if they want their
money back.
These are standard practices at even upscale German Supermärkte,
so high-end groceries are cheaper relative to other goods than they are
here. This is why I am hoping for Aldi’s rousing success in Amiland:
so that more of our stores, and our culture in general, will
incorporate such Teutonic efficiency. First the cost-savings of bagging
our own groceries—then the ubiquitous bicycle lanes; immaculate, punctual public transportation; and, finally, required paid vacation and parental leave. It would be ausgezeichnet indeed, meine Lieben.
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