Aldi pips Lidl to cheapest supermarket of the year - as Which? research shows grocery prices rising sharply
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Aldi has narrowly pipped rival Lidl to be named cheapest
supermarket of the year by Which? - as the consumer champion finds
grocery costs going up even at budget stores. Which? tracked
hundreds of thousands of grocery prices across the UK’s eight major
supermarkets throughout 2021 to find out how much each shop was
charging for everyday items such as bread, milk and eggs.
While revealing which supermarket was the cheapest over the
course of...Request free trial
Aldi has narrowly pipped rival Lidl to be named cheapest supermarket of the year by Which? - as the consumer champion finds grocery costs going up even at budget stores.
Which? tracked hundreds of thousands of grocery prices across the UK’s eight major supermarkets throughout 2021 to find out how much each shop was charging for everyday items such as bread, milk and eggs.
While revealing which supermarket was the cheapest over the course of the year, Which?’s analysis also shows that prices have been creeping up, with supermarkets charging up to nine per cent more in December than they did last January.
Overall Aldi was the cheapest supermarket for six of the 12 months while Lidl was the cheapest for five including December 2021. For one month, January 2021, Aldi and Lidl were tied with a basket of 19 items coming in at £18.45 at both discounters.
Lidl, winner of the cheapest supermarket accolade for 2020, was the cheapest supermarket in December, at £23.29 for a basket of 22 groceries, just beating Aldi, where the basket was £23.64. Meanwhile, Waitrose was more than £9 pricier than Lidl, at £32.85 - that's 41 per cent more. In fact, Waitrose was consistently the most expensive across the 12 months. A basket of everyday items cost from £6 to over £10 more at Waitrose per month than the cheapest supermarket. Alongside the price comparison of a basket of groceries at all eight supermarkets, Which? also compares a larger trolley packed with a greater selection of items such as Cathedral City cheddar and Kenco coffee, that are not always available at the discounters (Aldi and Lidl) - meaning they cannot be included in this bigger comparison. Asda was the cheapest of the traditional supermarkets and has been for every month for the last two years now. Waitrose was also the most expensive each month except one in 2021 for this wider analysis. The analysis also revealed that prices had risen significantly over the course of the last 12 months. Which? found that prices for the basket of everyday items had risen the most at Waitrose - by a massive nine per cent, compared to the average three per cent rise across all eight supermarkets.
Even prices at Aldi and Lidl rose between January and December 2021 - in both cases at more than the average rate.
Sainsbury’s managed to keep its prices relatively steady over the year with the smallest price rise of 0.59 per cent in Which?’s analysis.
Which? also found that some own-brand grocery items rose more in price than others across all eight supermarkets. The biggest increases among items in Which?’s basket were for Royal Gala apples (up 14%), free-range eggs (up 12%), brown onions (up 11%), skimmed milk (up 10%) and semi-skimmed milk (up 9%).
Ele Clark, Which? Retail Editor, said:
“No one wants to overpay for basic groceries, especially when a cost of living crunch is putting extra pressure on household budgets.
“Our findings show that while prices are going up, some supermarkets are passing their rising costs onto shoppers more than others. As well as choosing a supermarket that is cheap overall, other ways to save include swapping from branded to own-brand products, sticking to a shopping list and resisting the temptation to pick up special offers you don’t need.”
ENDS
Notes to editors: Which? Analysis
Price rises Which?’s analysis uncovered an average price rise of 3.4 per cent for a trolley of 19 items across all the supermarkets. Waitrose prices went up the most (9.2%), and Sainbury’s the least (0.59%)
The products that rose the most across all of the supermarkets were:
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