The discount grocery chain Aldi is expanding rapidly and plans to open more than 180 U.S. stores this year as more Americans skip nights out at restaurants and cook at home due to anxiety over the nation's economy.
The chain, with U.S. operations based outside of Chicago, went on an expansion tear soon after inflation began to spike in 2021 and opened a record number of new stores last year.
Food inflation has slowed, but it was still up 2.4% last year, according to U.S. data, and has soared about 25% since the pandemic. On Tuesday, the U.S. Labor Department said that grocery prices jumped 0.7% in December from the previous month, and that price hikes accelerated faster in 2025 than they had in the previous two years.
Last month beef and veal prices climbed 1% from November, and are up 16.4% from last year. Coffee prices increased 1.9% in a month and are up almost 20% over a year. Egg prices dropped 8.2% in December, continuing to fall after surging last year after a bird flu outbreak.
Aldi has sought to snap up market share as more families trade down, meaning they are changing where they shop to cut costs.
Americans are dropping trusted name brands for cheaper store-brands and swapping out the places they've shopped for years in favor of discount or thrift stores. It's been a boon for national bargain stores chains like Dollar General and Dollar Tree.
That shift had begun before President Donald Trump's trade war began, but appears to have accelerated over the past year.
Aldi said in 2024 that it planned to open 800 new stores by 2028 as inflation worries spread. It announced plans to open a record 225 locations last year in the U.S.
