My First trip to ALDI

Until recently, I’d never been inside an ALDI store. I have friends who love Aldi’s and tell me about the great finds they’ve made, so I’ve been meaning to get there and see for myself. I was given the opportunity to check out some of their wines recently, so I headed in for my first trip to ALDI.

The first thing I learned about ALDI is that you have to bring a quarter if you want to use their shopping carts. For some reason, no one ever mentioned that to me even though it’s very interesting, I think. So I headed over to get my cart and found them all locked together. A really sweet lady returning her cart showed me that you push a quarter into the cart handle slot and it releases the chain, freeing your cart. When you are finished and lock the cart back up, the chain goes back in and your quarter comes back out. It’s a great way to keep the carts where they belong and save the customers money.

Once I had a cart, I headed inside. The store isn’t nearly as big as other grocery stores. My store only had 3 large aisles. One of the first sections I came to was the wine and party food area. There were desserts, crackers, appetizers and dips. I picked out several great items from this area for Christmas visits from family and a New Year’s party.

The wine selection was great. There were Pinot Grigios, Sauvignon Blancs, Chardonnays, Moscatos and more white wines. Red wines from Cabernets, Merlots, Pinot Noirs and others. I decided on the Chaza Moscato to go with some desserts and the Villa Malizia Pinot Grigio to be paired with a Brie appetizer.

So far, we’ve only had the Moscato with apple pie. I served it to my family earlier today and every really enjoyed it. I’m not a wine connoisseur, but I do love wine and know when I like or don’t like a bottle. The Moscato was great, not too sweet, kind of light and fruity. It was perfect with the apples and the sweetness of the pie, I thought. And for only $4.99, I’d say it was awesome! I’ve paid a lot more for similar tasting Moscato and will be buying it at ALDI from now on instead.

ALDI isn’t as large as most grocery stores, so it doesn’t carry all of the items that you’d normally find in them. I did find everything I needed for both parties and some weekly grocery shopping, though. For under $50, I got 2 bottles of wine, an apple pie, a turtle pie, 2 packages of Brie cheese, a huge box of fancy crackers, Cheddar Cheese Appetizer, peanut butter, bananas and a petite cheesecake sampler box.

I was adding the prices up as I shopped, but I was still amazed when the total really did come out under $50. For all of these items, I ended up spending $49.70!

One other thing I didn’t know before shopping at ALDI was that they don’t have bags. You bring your own or do without. I have a few re-usable shopping bags, so I was all set, but hadn’t known ahead of time that I’d have to use them. It’s great for the environment, of course, and probably the way that many other stores will go in the future. It’s also another way that Aldi saves the customer money.

I had a great experience shopping at Aldi. I think that I’ll have to hit another local grocery store from time to time to stock up on items that ALDI doesn’t carry, but on the whole I saved a lot of money and will definitely start shopping there.

If you’re interested in trying some great wines or other products from ALDI, check them out online for an ALDI store near you.

I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of ALDI and received a gift certificate to facilitate my review.