Aldi Nord and Süd bundle purchasing

T.TranBusiness

Consumers must prepare for new brands

Author: Than-Duy Tran
Date: 08.07.2019

The discounters Aldi Süd and Aldi Nord intend to bundle their purchasing activities and streamline their product portfolios.

Consumers must therefore be prepared for the fact that there is only one private label in both shops, as in the case of milk, for example. Aldi Süd customers are familiar with the Milfina brand, Nord customers with Milsani. The transformation should be completed by the end of 2020 at the latest. The newspaper “Lebensmittel Zeitung” reports this and refers to confirmation from the public relation department.

Aldi splits purchasing by product groups

Nevertheless, both companies will maintain their own purchasing departments. However, individual areas will be divided into Aldi Süd and Aldi Nord. Accordingly, Aldi Nord is responsible for non-alcoholic beverages. For consumers, this means that brands like “Topstar” will soon be replaced by “River Cola” or “Milsani” by “Milfina”.

The background to the new purchasing strategy is a more uniform marketing approach, as the grocery discounter cannot currently advertise the same way throughout Germany because the brand has different names and looks in both stores.

The background to the new purchasing strategy is a more uniform marketing approach, as the grocery discounter cannot currently advertise the same way throughout Germany because the brand has different names and looks in both stores.

Price war at Edeka

There are also changes in Aldi’s bid strategy. For the first time, the discounter wants to offer branded products from the permanent range at special prices. The low prices are unlikely to please the competition from Lidl and Kaufland.

In this way, Aldi is increasing the pressure on manufacturers to offer the lowest possible prices. In recent months, Edeka in particular has made headlines over and over again because the supermarket chain banned popular brands from its stores. This was due to price disagreements. In the dispute with ketchup manufacturer Heinz, for example, Edeka sold its own brand without further comment.