ALDI — Local services in Aiken County

Years ago used to buy Aldi's chili beans, during US inflation threat the chili beans turned very salty tasting, used to buy canned beef stew for my husband's lunch, turned extremely salty, although the salt content remained the same on the contents label, we stopped buying both items - used to buy their almond milk, they started putting too much thickener- a filler in it, it tasted globby. In our area Sav a-lot beats many of their canned goods, on taste and price - i still like their canned fruit, especially the cling peaches and still I buy tem.

Aldi's produce quality is off and on - the grapes, whether organic or not taste like straight sugar, no grape flavor - I found better tasting grapes at Fresh Market but can be too high unless on sale but Sav alot and Bilo & Food Lion tend to be relatively reasonable and possess the real grape taste, Publix grapes, berries, etc very good too, but can be pricey.

The bakery products were excellent. But the sweets like rolls, cakes, pastries over time took on a cheap-tasting quality. Bread used to be very good, started tasting like paper; I noticed bread we bought went untouched till it became stale; had to stop buying the bread.

We still go for some of their chips, all Clancey products used to be great! Now, not quite as good, but still satisfactory on most items - I still like the pork skins; bbq skins the tastiest. most of the chips are pretty good, just not 'stand out' like they once were; able to compete with Lays and other known brands.

The avocados, apples, cheese, most of the trail mixes are still items I buy frequently and good value. The cashews used to be incredible; nice fleshy buttery nuts with a perfect saltiness - I loved them so much I turned my son-in-law on to them who lives in California. He switched for a while: Now just mediocre; smaller, harder, not salted to taste for bag content, less in bag too I believe. My son-in-law has switched back to his original brand. I buy cashew by the pound now at Krogers.

I am convinced Aldi's have the capacity to change their recipe/ingredients at will from a great product to an inferior one without warning or price reduction - a smart shopper friend told me there's two Lidl's grocers that have recently opened in nearby town. I saw them in England, but never tried them - my thought...just another Aldi imitator, and since at the time I was satisfied with Aldi's I saw no reason to venture. But she said the stores are nice inside, with a good selection and very good prices. I plan to check it out.

Lidl may be the only incentive for Aldi to improve - and their recent remodeling to what may be described as wherehouse style looks junky and chaotic, but perhaps just in my town.

Forgive me if I sound extremely critical, but the change and quality was so noticeable to me, my buying-eating pleasure was decreased significantly. PS - The Romaine lettuce 3-pak is still a great deal if you can find the deeper green leaf heads.

*I upgraded to 3-Star because I'm thankful Aldi is still here and a 2 1/2...

Had one of the worst encounters with a cashier I've ever had at any store ever. I was shopping with my mother (she's on the older side and gets flustered/confused very easily) and when we got to the checkout lane the woman behind us threw her groceries on the conveyer belt WHILE IT WAS ON AND MOVING and my mom still had groceries in her cart she's trying to load on the belt. The cashier was not paying attention and when my mom got confused when the cashier was beginning to ring up the other woman's stuff with her's, the cashier started making her frustration with this confusion visible with snarky remarks. I've worked retail and I was a receptionist so I understand stress in customer service jobs but again, my mom is a senior citizen that's extremely easily confused. Somebody having an attitude with her when the entire situation is a simple solution of a) maybe turn the conveyer off and b) ask the woman behind us to please use the dividers provided to completely avoid situations like this. Instead this cashier got upset with my mom over her incorrectly saying yes to a bag of berries being hers (it belong to the other woman). This was all rude but once that situation was under control I shrugged off the offputting attitude of this cashier. I had our shopping cart and was trying to get out my mom's way so she could pay and when she was trying to get the cart with her groceries, this cashier literally GOT OUT OF HER CHAIR to argue with me about the shopping carts. I don't understand why but she was under the impression we were trying to leave with 2 carts. I'm not stupid and I've shopped at Aldi's hundreds of times before, I know the carts need to be placed next to the cashier for the next person. I literally didn't even get a chance to get her the damn cart before she caused a scene with us in front of several other customers about the cart. I've never had a cashier literally pick an argument with me over something so pointless and unnecessary. Actually, I've never in my life had a cashier try to argue with me ever. The entire scene was embarrassing and honestly i really wished I asked for the manager in that moment. To the store manager: maybe find employees with a little more patience and isn't so absurdly hot headed to work directly with your customers, because that woman makes me never wanna go back to that...

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