Discount the discounters no more
Go back a few years and it was commonplace for people to take their own carrier bags from the likes of M&S and Sainsbury’s into Aldi and Lidl rather than using these supermarkets’ own bags such was the potential embarrassment from being seen shopping at the hard discounters.
This snobbishness around such stores gradually petered out as the perception shifted from people being seen as skint for using such grocers and instead regarded as savvy for shopping economically. There was also a realisation that their low prices did not reflect poor quality and that often the discounters’ own brand goods were better quality than the major grocers’ ‘basics’ own label ranges.
Subscribe to TRBThis change in mind-set took some years and for me the reassessment of the position of both Aldi and Lidl products came when the media department of the former sent me a hamper to try out. It had a range of impressive items the most notable of which was a frozen Beef Wellington. My family was initially sceptical about how this beast of a dish would taste when removed from the oven.
The fact I can vividly recall the experience some 15-plus years later highlights that it seriously over-delivered on taste and has compared well with any versions of this high-end dish that I’ve had since – apart from the one I had at Wilton’s restaurant in St James’ but that’s another world.
Such has been the progress by Aldi and Lidl in the UK market that they have combatted those early perceptions and become part of the food scene in this country. In doing so they have confounded many City analysts who for years questioned whether they would ever realistically compete with the big four major grocers.
They have also proved former Tesco CEO Sir Terry Leahy wrong. In 2014 he suggested that while discount retailers like Aldi and Lidl had experienced a strong period of growth, their “day in the sun” was maturing as the economy improved and main players adapted. Well, here we are in early 2026 and things have not played out the way he predicted.
Asda is experiencing declining market share – having fallen from around 11.5% to 12.6% – while Aldi has quickly grown to around 11%, which has created an incredibly tight race for the position of third-largest UK supermarket. The most recent data has been showing Aldi sometimes overtaking Asda in certain food-only sales.
Meanwhile Lidl has been on the march and achieved a record 8.3% share of the UK grocery market in March 2026, making it the joint fifth-biggest supermarket alongside Morrisons. This has made it the fastest-growing of the major grocers having grown its share from 7.8% last year as it has undertaken a rapid store expansion programme. And it is not finished yet, having just announced ambitious plans to open more than 50 new stores over the next year as it commits over £600 million of investment to the UK market.
This continued uprising of the discount grocers is mirrored in the US where the likes of Walmart, Dollar Tree, Dollar General, Five Below and Aldi have been attracting the custom of higher income households who have become more value-conscious in these tough economic times.
This scenario has prompted expansion by Aldi, which has in recent years been the fastest-growing US grocery chain by both new store openings and square footage. Interestingly, nearly two-thirds of these outlets are in areas with high concentrations of mid-to-high income households. To fully highlight how Aldi – in the US and UK – has truly changed the perceptions of its proposition it will later this year open a store on the ground floor of the Ellery, a high-rise luxury apartment building near New York’s Times Square, where a studio apartment goes for nearly $4,700 per month. That’s the equivalent of a lot of beef Wellingtons at Aldi’s prices.
