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Comment by das_keyboard | Hacker News Reader

How naive of me to ecpect anything else than an us-only map when this is about a german supermarket chain with most of its stores in europe...

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There are 2,356 Aldi stores in the US right now and it's probably growing. They've been expanding massively here for the past 10-15 years or longer.

"Aldi" is actually split across two different companies that operate in different regions of the world: Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd. In the US, Aldi Süd operates the Aldi stores, whereas Aldi Nord owns Trader Joe's.

Is LIDL related to the group at all? I've been seeing them pop up too

They're a competitor.

No, Lidl is part of another group that also owns Kaufland.

Reminds me of how the world was divided into a Spanish and Portuguese hemisphere in 1494 ;)

I think the problem there is that Aldi and Trader Joe's stores are in the same territory, should we be looking at localized warfare? :D . I like both, but Trader Joe's is always ridiculously crowded. They could add two more here and still be "crowded" but not "oh-my-god I can't go into that mess". I think they're leaving money laying on the table with this choice. I've lived in 3 cities and it was always the same, too much for those of us who get anxious when every time you stop to pick up something for more than two seconds, you have someone looking over your shoulder at the same thing.

For a long time there was only 1 NYC Trader Joes, in Union Square, and it was a madhouse. Fortunately they do tend to expand, it just takes a while. Off-peak hours like weekday mornings help too.

Aldi Nord and Süd are not competing and have significant corporations in supply chain and marketing

They're now the third largest chain in the USA.

> They've been expanding massively here for the past 10-15 years or longer.

Yup, in my state they basically bought out ALL of the old Bed Bath and Beyond leases and are converting them to Aldi supermarkets.

What the hell, my brand new Aldi is an old BBB too! (split in half)

There are 4.215 Aldi stores in Germany, 1.997 of those from Aldi Süd who also operates the US stores. Add to that 960 Aldi Süd stores in the UK, 530 in Austria, and a couple more in the other neighboring countries, and I think it's completely fair to be surprised if an aldi price map focuses completely on the US.

There is a big discussion in the EU for some products that are far more expensive in some countries over others. If someone who do this for Aldi in Europe, they would see that some "more expensive" countries, are selling the very same products at lower prices than some of the "more cheap" ones.

And that will piss people off, and politicians everywhere don't liked pissed-off people.

Well I did search for any available data for Germany but nothing available easily :|

To be fair, this was more of a tongue in cheek response and not really directed at you or your project directly.

For me Aldi is just such a european thing that I was genuinely surprised by this.

Don't forget there are two Aldi (Aldie?) the yellow South and the Blue North and they both have a different international footprint just to complicate things

there are even memes about this. Like this tactical map: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/zacwvs/supermarket...

Aldi North is called Trader Joe's in the USA.

It's not the same. Aldi Nord just owns Trader Joe's

https://www.aldireviewer.com/aldi-and-trader-joes-are-they-t...

Yep. I shop at a building with an Aldi on the 1st floor and a Trader Joes on the 2nd floor. It's wonderful.

I popped into an Aldi in Portugal ~6 months ago, and I noticed they had some Trader Joe's products on the shelves. Unsurprisingly, Aldi Portugal is owned by Aldi Nord.

In Austria, Aldi (South) is called Hofer.

It is pretty big in US as well :)

Maybe I read too much reddit and I've been primed [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priming_(psychology)]

But I read this as another anti-American comment which seems to be very fashionable recently.

As an American, I can understand the European internet user’s chagrin at our seeming total cultural ubiquity. It seems like almost every piece of media is about American concerns unless explicitly stated otherwise.

Just the other day the US news were all ablaze about how the Super Bowl was the biggest viewed program on television since Apollo 11. Except of course, the Eurovision Song Contest is way bigger.

If the location is not explicitly stated the default is the US. That's the Internet.

I don't understand. YC is an American company in English. Why are visitors so surprised when most of the content is US based?

Also Merica' #1 ... jk :)

Content in English means it’s fair for all those who speak English. Unless you want a build a wall across the internet to keep rest of us out.

It is absolutely not true that just because a message is in English it has the intended audience of all English speakers.

How is anyone supposed to divine that a general English statement about a European MNC was restricted to just America?

It’s like me saying “McDonalds has stopped selling hamburgers” and expecting you to magically understand that this statement is about Indian McD’s and not American McDs.

Aldi was pretty ubiquitous in the rural Midwestern United States around where I grew up in the 1990s. We didn't associate it at all with Germany or Europe, and I had no idea about the company's origins until I read about it on Wikipedia many years later.

At least for Austria theree seems to be this: https://github.com/badlogic/heissepreise

There is a link to raw data (a big json). Aldi is Hofer in Austria. Prices are probably the same in all their stores? Not sure something similar exists for Germany.

Thanks for making this. Is there data provided for iodized table salt?

If you are the creator, the problem is more the title. You could write something like "Aldi Price Map in the US". Your current title is a good example of US defaultism and I happens way often (even in social studies where the scientist should be just embarrassed for that).

I don't get this criticism at all. Somebody created something for free to scratch their itch, and they're likely from the US, why would they bother with anything else? If it's so important to you, you can always scratch your own itch, I doubt the author of the project would mind help.

I don’t see anything indicating criticism in op’s comment, seems more like an expression of surprise.

It's US centric and US-only but the title doesn't say so, especially for the brand that's not usually associated with the US

Did the TLD provide any clues? I would Germans would prefer a .de domain.

Aldi is big in Australia too, around 600 stores across the country.

We have fixed prices across the country though (Australia that is). Interesting that its so varied in the US, completely different model.

It’s not just the US. Im an American working remotely for a European grocery delivery platform, and one of the key feature requests from partners in UK and France is location-specific pricing. Presumably price discrimination for those in wealthier neighborhoods.

> price discrimination for those in wealthier neighborhoods.

In the case of this Aldi price map, they are doing regional pricing - it would seem that every store in an area has the same price regardless of neighborhood wealth for the individual store. So you get naval oranges in Los Angeles at $1.89, $2.39 in Chicago, and $2.99 in New York City (and Houston).

The difference probably has a lot to do with the cost structure for operating the distribution network. If you switch to the organic pasta sauce, it appears that the price is the same $1.99 everywhere except Los Angeles, where it is $2.19. Their oranges are likely coming from California and their pasta sauce is coming from somewhere east of the Mississippi.

It's not necessarily wealth that governs price changes, but access. Anyone with a car and 'enough' money for gas can go to the store across town if it's cheaper, but if a store is isolated enough by geography or neighborhood income level, you'll likely see higher prices.

Case in point: the Kroger in Oxford Ohio (where Miami of Ohio's campus is located) has had remarkably higher prices than other Krogers in the area for as long as I've known. Oxford is 'close' to Cincinnati, but there's enough corn and soybean fields between the two to make the trip a pain.

And that’s why dollar store and similar shops are huge in rural poor America

message the author and create the european map? create the map you want to see in the world

Aldi (and Lidl) are okay. But I wish Europe had Trader Joe's (owned by Aldi) and Costco.

There are some Trader Joe's products in my local Aldi in Poland.

At Aldi Nord in Germany, the "Trader Joe's" products are just the usual cheap garbage with a label slapped on it. It's nothing like the interesting stuff you get in the US.

Lidl expanding into the US makes my european wife very happy.

We have Costco the last time I checked, at lest in the UK and Spain.

We have Costco in Sweden, it's terrible, I'd never pay for a membership to be able to shop...

I've always found the cashback rewards to cover the membership cost, YMMV though. I also live for the hot dogs

They don't have a cashback program here.

In the US, the standard Costco membership does not offer cash back, the premium membership does. If you don't have the auto-renewal set up, they'll tell you which version is a better deal based on your purchase history from the prior year.

Ah I didn't realize cashback was US and Canada only. Purchasing over $6000/year will cover the fee, which isn't cheap if you don't do much shopping there. The rewards site has a table with reward estimates: https://www.costco.com/executive-rewards.html

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