After drama rising prices V food discounters are booming, focusing on inexpensive goods. It is therefore quite appropriate that the inventor Aldi celebrates an important anniversary this year. Exactly 110 years ago, the Albrecht family founded discount stores. Supermarket Aldi and laid the foundations for its current trading empire. Baker Karl Albrecht began “bakery products” in Essen on April 10, 1913. From a small shop grew one of the largest trading empires in the world. Sister companies Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd now operate not only in Europe and North America, but even in Australia.

“Today discounters with their low prices are more than ever an important support for many households,” the expert told the German News Agency (DPA). retail Robert Keskes of private research firm GfK. It is therefore not surprising that, according to GfK, discount stores increased their market share in Germany from 34.8% to 36.9% in just 12 months to the end of 2022, driven by supermarkets and specialty retailers. At the beginning of the year, sales continued to shift towards low-cost carriers.

However, despite his innovative spirit, it is not the baker Karl Albrecht who is behind the success of the Albrecht family, but his sons, Karl Jr. and Theo Albrecht, who have made the company great. After the death of their father, they took over the business and developed the concept of discounts. The first Aldi store (short for Albrecht-Diskont) opened in 1962, 60 years ago. The recipe for success was a small range of products in a simple environment at low prices, which caused great concern among competitors, i.e. supermarkets.

But today’s Aldi stores have little in common with those of the past. If at one time cool neon light and goods on wooden pallets characterized the image of stores, then modern design with a pleasant atmosphere has long prevailed. And, in addition to classic brands, there are now more and more branded products.

However, their most important feature – low price – now also creates difficulties. Because even those stores have been forced to raise their prices significantly lately — proportionally even more than many well-known brands, according to Keskes. But the decisive thing is that, despite the rise in prices, their own products usually remain significantly cheaper again. So is everything rosy in the jubilee year? Not really. According to retail expert Gerrit Heinemann of the Niederhein University of Applied Sciences, there is an abandoned area in the Aldi chain. This is e-commerce. “The discount business has not yet had to seriously engage in e-commerce,” the expert says. But it is only a matter of time before the problem in question affects these stores as well. “And then it will be difficult for Aldi, because the competitor Lidl has a significant advantage there.”

In the latest ranking of the Cologne retail research institute EHI, Lidl managed to secure a place in the top ten German e-commerce retailers for its online store. With a turnover of one billion euros, lidl.de ranked 8th in the ranking. In comparison, Aldi’s online store does not appear in the top 100 companies at all.