Aldi’s Grocerant niche Ready-to-Eat and Heat-N-Eat food is getting ‘better-for-You’

Regular readers of this blog know that Aldi is the fastest growing grocery store chain in the United States. According to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® Aldi is the fastest growing grocery store chain because it understands the undercurrents driving retail foodservice today better than any other retailer in the US with the possible exception of Amazon.

Aldi's consumer driven private-label brands have earned this German-based supermarket a reputation as one of the cheapest options for home shoppers. However now Aldi is expanding their lineup to include more grocerant niche consumer deemed healthy foods.

Grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat food are expanding rapidly at Aldi bringing freshly spiralized veggie noodles, a new line of kombucha drinks, gluten-free breads and bagels, frozen kale and quinoa burgers, and a whole section of certified organic meats to all of their U.S. stores. With newly remodeled stores and lots of remodeling underway Aldi is making room for convenient ready-to-eat items—like fresh salads and sliced fruits as well edifying the ‘grocerant niche ‘halo’ of better-for-you with consumers.

Consumers will see a 20-percent increase of fresh ingredients and Ready-2-Eat options, with new products being slowly rolled out to all 1,800 stores currently open by the end of January 2019 as the current remodeling winds up. The focus on health is just one aspect of Aldi's growth plan over the next few years, Aldi plans to remodel and expand its store count to 2,500 by the end of 2022.

Aldi is expanding its Earth Grown line of frozen plant-based products, to include vegan chicken tenders and patties as well as kale and quinoa veggie burgers. Highlighting the expanding role of grocerant niche products, Aldi is introducing meal starters like microwavable quinoa bowls and canned pasta sauce, meatless sausages and hot dogs. So, if your company is not growing as fast a Aldi, it just might be time you considered entering the grocerant niche is a serious way.

Foodservice Solutions® specializes in outsourced business development. We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities or a new menu product segment and brand and menu integration strategy.  Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma WA is the global leader in the Grocerant niche visit Facebook.com/Steven Johnson, Linkedin.com/in/grocerant/ or twitter.com/grocerant