Hubs New Home

So, husband may have a new home. Have you ever heard of Aldi? It's a grocery store chain that has RI.DIC.U.LOUS.LY low prices-this works because you have to pay a quarter for a grocery cart, they don't bag ANYTHING, and they have all generic brands. Seriously, you want some Kraft cheese? No, they have Hidden Farms cheese. Campbell's soup? They have Right Start broth. Gatoradae? They have Lightening Bolt. It's hilarious.

We searched out our local Aldi today and set off for an adventure, neither of us with me not expecting to find anything worth buying. Sometimes I'm a name brand ho. First thing we notice (after we PAY for our cart), is that there are no shelves of any type. Everything is stacked on pallets and it's seemingly organized by "groups" like snacks, baking items, produce, etc. So within the first 3 feet of the door, the pallets start. Husby starts rolling with it-he's like, "Do we need granola? Fruit by the foot? Crackers? Allspice? Lard? Milk?" Hmm, we need milk-guess how much it is-wait for it: $1.49/gal! OMG-right! Now it's called "Milk Land's Best" or something, but OK, I'll try it. I pay $3.69 or more at Publix or Walmart. We keep going and he keeps calling out: "18 pounds potatoes? Cheese? Marrow bone? 4 pounds frozen shrimp?" In all, we got NINE items off of my grocery list. We go through checkout and it's $16.00! And you get your quarter back when you return the cart-sa weet! Look at what we got:

Salad in a bag 1.89

Grape tomatoes 0.99

Shredded cheddar 1.99

Biscuits 1.19

2 bags hashbrowns (like the "Real Potato" brand 3.00

Sausage 1.99

Skim milk 1.49

Peanut butter 1.39

Cooking spray (like PAM) 1.39

Tax 0.31

Total 15.61

Now, I am a LITTLE scared of the cheese and peanut butter-normally I only buy Kraft and Jif. But, I will try it. While we are going to checkout, husband says, "Dude, I could like SRSLY live here-I mean it has all the essentials. It's so awesome here." While I start having a mini panic attack about the lack of brand names, I have my epiphany. "But it's like 15 miles from out house, so we would really be wasting money coming here all the time for groceries." Yeah, he saw right through that.

On the way home, we stopped at Publix for the other 10 things on our list. Now the Aldi didn't have SOME things (like green onions, and their cucumbers were the size of my ARM), so we beebop into Publix and get:

Rolls 1.79

Jelly 2.29

Mayo 3.00 (because I wasn't about to use generic mayo)

Cheez-its 3.29

Splenda 4.29

Degree deodorant 2 for 4.00

Goldfish 2.19

Croutons 1.39

Ranch packet 1.49

Apples 3.46

Cucumber 0.65

Green onions 0.50

Tax 0.74

Total 29.07

Wow! Double the other price-but, I still don't see this store becoming a part of our future. But husband will be glad to know that I called ahead and reserved a bed for him in the back. Just in case he needs a fix of frugality. He can go there.