Good news for Aldi, bad news for customers

Australian shoppers have been waiting for months to find out when German supermarket chain Lidl would open its doors here, hoping their competitive pricing would force Coles, Woolworths and even Aldi to lower their prices even more.

Now though, it turns out Lidl has backed out of its plans to open stores in Australia, saying the competition is too strong and our population too small.

It’s great news for Aldi, who has been enjoying the title of Australia’s cheapest supermarket for a few years now.

Lidl was going to be its biggest threat to that title, with the supermarket stocking many items that are even cheaper than Aldi.

Shoppers around the country have been loving Aldi ever since it first hit our shores, but the arrival of Lidl had many people even more excited as it meant even cheaper groceries across the board.

Lidl executives visited Australia 18 months ago and set in place plans to open stores across the country.

Thanks to the fierce price war between Aldi, Coles and Woolworths though, it has decided to back out and head to America instead where it can get a bigger share of the market, reports SMH.

It’s bad news for customers who were hoping to save a few extra dollars at the checkout every week.

With the high cost of living and a pension rate that isn’t nearly enough to get by on, many seniors say they were hoping Lidl would help drive down prices at all the major supermarkets to make it a little easier to live week by week.

It looks like that won’t be happening any time soon though.

In the meantime, Aldi, Coles and Woolworths will continue to battle it out for customers and their dollars with many hoping the price drops at least continue in the coming months.

Are you disappointed Lidl won’t be coming to Australia? Have you noticed your grocery bill getting cheaper, or is it still expensive to do the weekly shop?