Instead of soft lighting and elaborate displays, stores like Aldi, Dollar General, Costco, and Trader Joe’s offer no-frills shopping experiences with few bells and whistles.
In turn, they can invest more in prices, giving them a distinct advantage over competitors, Mike Paglia, director of retail insights for Kantar Retail, told Business Insider.
“These retailers have very clear value positions that stand out in the marketplace — that’s whats driving their growth,” Paglia said.
Aldi, for example, doesn’t invest in shelves for many of its products. Instead, the items are stacked on top of each other in the boxes they were shipped in. This reduces the time it takes to keep the store stocked.
The chain also requires customers to put down a 25-cent deposit to use carts, which they get back once they return the cart so the company doesn’t have to pay an employee to round up the carts.
