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Lidl France = dodgy practices?


Evianers
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If you judge the prices in a supermarket by the "headline items" in their promo leaflets then you have Fallen squarely in the trap that they have baited for you. They are the items that persuade you to go into that shop and most people while they are there will buy all their other stuff there.

As someone who was forced to live for years on a fraction of what the French consider the poverty line I knew my prices well and continue to this date, I would have to visit all the stores if I wanted to find the cheapest of everything but certain rules stood and stand today.

Headline items like meat are indeed cheaper when on promo in the grand surfaces than Lidl or Aldi however the rest of the year they are significantly more, the fruit and veg, promos apart are hugely more expensive than Lidl or Aldi, consistently so.

You can generally find an item cheaper in the grand surfaces which many take to mean that the shop is cheaper, not necessarily so, Inter will have a whole rayon of yoghurts/cereal/saucissons whatever you like from every marque and including their own budget brand and often unknown sous-marques that are cheaper still, people often stick with the premium priced marque (that another psychology used against you) if you buy the budget own brand often its not very nice at all; Lidl and Aldi have a "one need, one offering" Policy, you will find but one natural yoghurt, it will be the same quality as the premium marques as its made on the same line, it will carry the ethereal brand name that Lidl have chosen like Elamesta and will be cheap and very good value rapport qualité/prix but you may well find a cheaper inferior product in the grand surfaces, you will have to search for it mind you as there will be so many offerings and the cheapest are always tucked away out of reach.

I do my shopping at Lidl, I go to Aldi for my coffee by preference while I am there I will but fruit and veg if its cheaper because I know the variable prices very well, if I go to Inter to buy some meat or fish on promo or like recently pillows from Leclerc those will be the only items I buy in there.

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Todays Lidl promos include a ladder at 50 euros. Damn and blast - it looks just like the one I bought a couple of weeks ago on a Bricomarche promo for 60 euros (normally 65). Oh, hang on, wait a minute.....the Lidl ladder is a metre shorter than the Bricomarché one.

The three items on the Lidl promo front page today:

4.5 kg Basmati at 1.22/ kg, normal price 1.34........Super U normal price 1kg packs cheapest 1.29, one I buy 1.36

Pack of 30 battonnets de poisson panés 3.10 /KG, normally 3.89...... Super U normal price from 3.52kg.

1.5L "jus d'orange" 55 cents a litre, normal price 73 cents......Super U normal price from 66 cents.

I've never understood why people who shop at Lidl feel the need to justify so strongly why they do so. I also don't know who votes them the best supermarket chain, they must have an awful lot of invisible customers judging from our local stores. Our Super U has parking for around 600 cars (and being enlarged to keep up with demand) and Lidl has spaces for 50.

Steve
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[quote user="SC"]Todays Lidl promos include a ladder at 50 euros. Damn and blast - it looks just like the one I bought a couple of weeks ago on a Bricomarche promo for 60 euros (normally 65). Oh, hang on, wait a minute.....the Lidl ladder is a metre shorter than the Bricomarché one. [/quote]

Is anyone evangelising about Lidl?

It's just another shop with some bargains as you posted in your local shop there are also some bargains. Me it's taste as well as cost and generally each shop has it's good and not so good products, probably depending on how attractive a deal the buyers can get.

Yes ladders are produced in different lengths!  it not much fun buying one too long to put up indoors that your neck has a serious crick in it because of the extra metre.  I know super markets feature both from time to time and also different styles from the "little Giant type to the fold up.

I definitely agree about the size of Lidl carparks in the UK, pain, never big enough but that only goes to show the considerable spread of the chain same with Aldi.

If it wasn't for the pressure applied to supplying goods at low cost by the likes of Lidl and Aldi does anyone really think the more established chains would be that price competitive?  Certainly making Tesco work bloody hard to compete as they lose market share.

Then there is the snob value of not being seen in Lidl, as I reminded my SIL M&S started with a cart in a high street market as did quite a few others and only got big by selling low grade goods with a bigger margin.

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