Aldi Facts

The Aldi name is a syllabic abbreviation for Albrecht Diskont (Discount)

Aldi is two different companies: Aldi Nord and Aldi Sud, or North and South. During the 1960s, Theo and Karl Albrecht could not agree on whether or not they were going to allow their stores to sell cigarettes. They came up with an interesting solution; instead of compromising they divided the company in half.
There is a line that runs across Germany known as the "Aldi equator" and Theo took the north while Karl took the south. You can tell the difference by looking at the logo: Nord's logo is a basic blue and white, Sud's logo is orange and blue. The southern Aldi is a bit fancier. When it came time to expand to the rest of the world, other countries were also divided. Stores in areas like the UK, Ireland, and Australia are all Aldi Sud, while Aldi Nord took France and Poland.


There is only one country where Aldi Nord and Aldi Sud share pieces of the grocery store pie, and that is in the US. Aldi Sud, with its blue and orange logo does business as Aldi, and Aldi Nord uses another name, Trader Joe's.

This year, 2018 Aldi and Kohl's announced Kohl's will sublet space to Aldi in limited stores in the US.

Facts About Aldi

It was founded by brothers Karl and Theo Albrecht in 1946 when they took over their mother's store in Essen, Germany which had been in operation since 1913. It is one of the world's largest privately owned companies. The name is a syllabic abbreviation for Albrecht Diskont.

The German discount supermarket chain is the ninth largest retailer in the world, following Walmart, Tesco, Costco, Carrefour, Kroger, Lidl, Metro AG, and Home Depot. Target is number ten. Five of the top ten are American and three of the top ten are German owned.

• Nine of ten items Aldi sells are store brands,
• You must bring your own bags,
• You must pay 25 cent deposit for cart (you get it back when returned),
• Aldi accepts no coupons,
• Items at Aldi are, on average, 53% cheaper than at Walmart,
• Aldi owns Trader Joe's.