Inflation is inevitable. Each year the cost of living steadily increases, including the price of groceries. From 2007 to 2017, food items like butter saw a 10% price increase while ground beef went up by a whopping 45%. One way to mitigate higher prices is couponing, another option is shopping at stores with overall lower prices. Both Trader Joe’s and Aldi are regarded as cheaper options, but it’s Aldi that takes the discounted cake, often being the less expensive of the two.
Funnily enough, Trader Joe’s is an auxiliary brand of Aldi. Shortly after World War II, Karl and Theo Albrecht transformed their late mother’s convenience store into the first Aldi. In 1961, the brothers decided to split the company into Aldi Nord and Aldi Sud and with that split Karl obtained the rights to the Aldi brand in the U.S, while Theo went on to create the Trader Joe’s brand in the States. This shared root explains the overlap in business concepts like the specialty item section, great values on wines, and their respectively eponymously and off-brand labels. With that little tidbit of history, let’s dive into the savings.
The deals on charcuterie items
When shopping for the best ingredients on your next southern style charcuterie board, both these stores seem to offer great variety. You’ll find a selection of niche cheeses for the board while there are cornichons, marinated olives, and jams perfect for the accompanying flavors. Let’s compare one of each basic you’d need for your boards: a cured meat, specialty cheese, a starch like toast points or crackers, and a type of marinated vegetable. Aldi’s cost for the items comes to $14.62 with Trader Joe’s totaling $15.46 for similar items. Aldi wins the point here.
Egg prices that are easy on the budget
Eggs are a staple in most households. They are a fantastic source for protein, vitamins like Biotin, and great for dietary cholesterol. Eggs have climbed in price over recent years, so many shoppers are desperate to score the best deal. Rarely do you see a store beat Trader Joe’s on egg prices, including the cage-free variety that tends to be more expensive at large format grocers. In the competition between TJ’s and Aldi, there’s no egg-ception (not sorry). Aldi prices its cage-free eggs at $3.99 a dozen. But at Trader Joe’s, a dozen cage-free eggs is only $3.49! Let’s go Trader Joe’s.
A whole lot of savings on milk
The type of milk you drink will be the deciding factor for which store has the better buy. Aldi and Trader Joe’s are equally matched when comparing half gallons of organic 2% milk, both ringing up at $3.79. For non-organic half gallons of whole milk Aldi charges just $1.31, whereas Trader Joe’s charges $2.69. That’s over a dollar in savings just by switching stores. Although, the extra $1.38 might be worth it if you’re getting to shop at the Trader Joe’s located in a beautiful old movie theatre. But, alas, Aldi takes the point here.
Prices for butter your wallet will melt for
Another dairy kitchen staple, butter, comes in marginally cheaper at Aldi’s over Trader Joe’s. Between the two stores, salted butter costs $3.55 at Aldi’s compared to TJ’s $3.99, respectively. Next time you’re making cookies or laminating deliciously flaky puff pastry for at home croissants (which takes up a good bit of butter) pick it up at your local Aldi. Grab some ice cream while you’re there too, as that comes in at an even better deal than the butter. A 42-ounce container of ice cream foes for $3.15 at Aldi, while TJ’s 1-quart ice cream (32 ounces, to be exact) comes in at $4.49.
Extra virgin olive oil outlier
Despite coming in cheaper with most of the items on this list, Aldi is surprising expensive for extra virgin olive oil, charging over $8 for 33.8 ounces. At Trader Joe’s, the same size jug costs right under $6. That’s a savings of two dollars on just one item. Huge win for Trader Joe’s in this category, and a huge when for you when sourcing extra virgin olive oil for drizzling on a texturally divine bruschetta dish.
The final savings score
The winner in the battle of the more affordable Albrecht brother store is Aldi. While Trader Joe’s put up a good fight with the more affordable egg and olive oil prices, Aldi took home more wins for cheaper charcuterie items, butter, and whole milk, beating out TJ’s by a score of 3 to 2.
When heading to Aldi, the best day of the week to go is Wednesday, though a different day is when you can find limited-time hot deals. Meanwhile, Trader Joe’s loyalists can keep up with their frequent flyers to score some special deals that might under-cut those at Aldi.
