The results are in! Australia's favourite supermarket has just been revealed
Coles and Woolworths may have tried to keep shoppers coming back with their collectible campaigns, home deliveries and loyalty programs.
But a new survey of 2,897 consumers has found that ALDI has maintained its spot as Australia’s favourite supermarket.
Canstar Blue’s latest supermarkets review saw the German retailer taking the crown as the best-rated chain in the country, beating out major competitors IGA, Coles, Woolworths and Foodland. This is the seventh time in nine years that ALDI has topped the list.
Shoppers gave ALDI five stars for overall satisfaction as well as value for money, freshness of fruit and veggies, quality of private label products, and deals and specials. However, the budget supermarket only received three stars for customer service.
IGA came in second for overall satisfaction, followed by Coles at number three. Woolworths and Foodland rounded up the list in the fourth and fifth rank respectively.
Canstar’s Simon Downes said ALDI had found the right balance between quality products and competitive prices.
“This is why Coles and Woolies are trying so hard to liven up that shopping experience, giving us Coles Little Shop, or Lion King, things to collect to make it a bit more interesting,” he said.
ALDI’s customer service and communications director Adrian Christie said the chain is focusing on keeping prices affordable instead of following the trends that its competitors have jumped into.
“We are very focused on anything that adds cost and complexity that could jeopardise our business model and how we're able to provide our prices,” he told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.
“We like to stick to our knitting.”
While the retailer plans to stick to its successful business model for now, Christie said it is not ruling out any changes or new additions such as self-serve checkouts.
“While we have no plans to introduce self-serve checkouts, we’ll look at things that customers appreciate and see value in. And if it enhances the operations of our store, the customer experience and then we’ll obviously look to adopt those,” he said.
“There’s plenty of things we could do, from selling sushi and BBQ chickens right through to home delivery and self-checkout.
“We’ll pioneer where things make sense, but until we’ve looked at the business model and we’ve calculated that it won’t add to any cost to doing business, we’re putting them to the side.”