14 Aldi Secrets You'll Wish You Knew Sooner

When it comes to shopping at Aldi, being in the know goes a long way. The famed German store may look simple on the surface, but it's a retailer that keeps its cards close to the chest. There's a lot of classified information that Aldi's not sharing, from cashier secrets to shopping information that's kept strictly in confidence. A lot of the time, these secrets can help you have a better shopping experience, and they aren't kept for any enormous reason: Instead, they're treated sort of like Easter eggs for customers to discover along the way.

Well, it's time for those Easter eggs to be revealed, folks. As a frequent Aldi shopper who loves discovering the truth about how to get the best out of stores, I decided to put together all of the top secrets about shopping at Aldi that I've learned in my time. Some of these secrets, like the best time to shop in the week, the best private labels to opt for if you want top-quality products, and the best apps to use while in-store can get you some massive savings and help you ensure your shopping trip is successful. Other secrets will make your experience at Aldi smooth and stress-free, and you'll wish you knew them years ago. Ready to get the goods? We thought so.

Figuring out when to shop isn't just important to make your experience stress-free. It's also important because as we all know, some supermarkets can be a little hit and miss about what they have on their shelves at any given time. Although Aldis are normally well-stocked, there are certain times of the week when you'll find the best selection and the freshest produce. It's all down to the chain's restocking schedule, which is the same across most stores.

Most Aldis will restock their items periodically throughout the day and the week. However, the most thorough restock tends to take place on Wednesday mornings. This is usually when Aldi Finds are released, giving you a double whammy of new items to sink your teeth into. It should be noted that some stores release Aldi Finds on Sundays instead of Wednesdays, so it can be worth double-checking with your chosen branch before heading in. It's also useful to remember that the combo of restocking and Aldi Finds can make Wednesdays a fairly busy time to shop — but in our opinion, the crowds are worth it.

If you're looking to booze on a budget, there are few better places to stock up than Aldi. Aldi's wine selection is pretty legendary, and the store offers way more bang for its buck than you might think in this department. Red, white, rosé, and sparkling wines are all available at several different price points, with a number of the wines winning awards for their taste and quality. One award-winning white wine even won a Product Of The Year award, and a bottle comes in at under $10. Not bad, huh?

If you're unsure about which wine to buy, you generally can't go wrong with bottles that have a "Specially Selected" logo on the front label. These wines tend to be pretty curated with a few selections for each wine style, mostly coming in at a medium price point. If you're determined to keep things as cheap as possible, Aldi's California Heritage selection comes in at a reasonable price point and compares favorably to a lot of other retailers' budget wine ranges.

We've all been in a position where we've purchased an item from a store and ended up with buyer's remorse. For some reason, though, it can feel like a little more work to return things to supermarkets, even if the items we bought are somehow substandard. This isn't the case with Aldi. The retailer offers an incredibly generous return policy thanks to its Twice as Nice Guarantee, which gives you a full refund and a replacement of the item if you're not happy with it within 90 days of purchase. This is provided that you have the packaging for the item in question, and that it hasn't been used.

Sounds pretty good, huh? As always with return policies, there are a few things to keep in mind. The first is that the Twice as Nice Guarantee doesn't apply to every item at Aldi stores, with non-Aldi food items, national brands, and alcohol falling in the exceptions. As well, you'll need to have a receipt for the item you bought, or you won't get a full refund and may end up with a merchandise certificate instead.

How often do you check the website of your favorite supermarket? If you're anything like us, you probably don't do it that often — but you really should if you're heading to Aldi. The store's website is a treasure trove of information on savings, and it can show you exactly what price to expect on certain items before you head in. If you're doing a large shop, you can save dozens of dollars by comparing Aldi prices to what other retailers are charging, and calculating which items to buy at which store.

Plus, if you're thinking that the physical ads in the store are enough and you don't need to look at the website, we're afraid you're wrong. The Aldi website has the most up-to-date information on its prices, and they often differ fairly significantly from the prices on the paper ads. Therefore, you should never rely on the physical ads alone to tell you how much items cost in-store. Click onto the Aldi website and see how much everything really is.

If you've ever considered buying spices at Aldi, you may well have been put off by its rock-bottom prices. Honestly, folks, we get it. Aldi spices are suspiciously cheap, and we tend to associate higher spice prices with quality. Here's the thing, though — what if we told you that Aldi's spices are way better than you think, and there could be a good brand behind them that's supplying the store with its spice selection? While it's difficult to tell for certain, a lot of folks think that McCormick actually makes the Stonemill Aldi spice range, with a few clues that seem to back this up.

The first clue is the lids, as Stonemill's seem to be pretty similar to McCormick's. There's also the formulation of each spice, which keen-eyed observers have noted is near-identical for both brands across many of their products. As with a lot of private label ranges, it's not entirely clear whether McCormick's is actually the supplier, and a lot of this knowledge is based on customer observation and word-of-mouth info. However, it's pretty universally acknowledged that Aldi spices are really good, so don't be put off buying them.

Figuring out what price codes mean is a favorite hobby of ours, and we've had a lot of fun doing it at Aldi. It's not just for our entertainment, though. Learning to understand price codes can help you make purchases for items that may not be around for much longer. This is particularly important at a place like Aldi, which can revolve out certain items without much warning. If you're not careful, you may miss out on buying your favorite product, and never have an opportunity to get it again.

The key is to look out for a "D" in the price code. This will usually be on the bottom right of the item's shelf label, and may be after a number and before a hyphen. The D will tell you that the product will soon be discontinued, so you should snap it up real quick. It's worth keeping in mind that the presence of a D on a price code doesn't necessarily correlate to the color of the label itself, so don't get distracted by whether it's red or yellow.

Perhaps one of the most surprising secrets about Aldi is how accommodating it is of certain diets. It's especially good when it comes to gluten-free foods. Aldi has a generous gluten-free product line and often has a similar selection of items to more prominent retailers. If that wasn't good enough, you will likely also find that Aldi's gluten-free items are significantly less expensive than comparable items in other stores, in keeping with the retailer's commitment to maintaining its prices low — so you can stick to your diet and budget simultaneously.

Having said this, it's important to remember that Aldi's selection can vary considerably from store to store. If you're shopping at a smaller outlet, you might find that its gluten-free section is way more limited, and you can't get everything you need. It's therefore a good idea to head to the biggest store you can find to get your gluten-free goods. If you're unsure, you can also always call the store and ask the manager how large their gluten-free selection is, to save yourself from being disappointed once you finally arrive.

The bakery section at Aldi is way better than you probably expect. Most Aldis offer a generous selection of baked goods, and do so at a price point that's way lower than most other major supermarkets. Plus, you can make an even bigger saving with one bakery aisle secret, which involves simply checking the expiration date on the item you're buying. If you find that the baked good is nearing its expiration date, you might be able to get it marked down to a rock-bottom price.

Aldi bread is generally marked down a few days before its expiration date, and when it is, it'll get slapped with a big markdown sticker. However, it's entirely possible for employees to miss the expiration date — and if you can find one of these coveted items which is due to expire in a few days, then let them know and you'll be rewarded with a saving. You can also do this with any other baked good that is approaching the expiration date. Crucially, though, don't wait around to eat the bread or baked goods you buy. They'll start to be past their prime pretty quickly, so eat or freeze them as soon as possible.

A lot of stores go big on coupon offers to help their customers save money, but Aldi's not one of them. You'll rarely find the retailer offering coupons, and while they're not unheard of, they're usually linked to specific events instead of given out to entice customers. Aldi's mindset behind its lack of coupons is that its prices are already so low that it doesn't need to offer customers an extra discount — after all, the savings are already baked in.

However, that doesn't mean you can't pick up extra savings on the way — you just have to check out your apps. There's a wide variety of apps out there that offer cash back on purchases already made at Aldi, and if you're buying a large amount then this cash can add up. Banking apps are particularly likely to run time-limited or permanent cash back deals on retailers, and third-party apps like Ibotta can help you spy great savings. Crucially, these savings may only be on certain items in-store, so make sure you check what's eligible for cash back before you buy.

It's easy to feel like private label items at stores like Aldi are somehow lower quality than the name-brand items they sell. When you combine this with the fact that Aldi offers a good selection of name-brand products at a pretty low price, it can feel a bit strange to buy the house-brand option. After all, why compromise on quality when the savings are that good?

Because the private label items are worth buying, that's why. From personal experience, Aldi's private label range is just as good quality as the name-brand options it stocks, and you'll get that quality at a much lower price. In a lot of cases, you'll barely notice the difference. Essentials like breakfast cereals, coffee, bread, and dried goods like pasta and rice are virtually interchangeable from the more expensive stuff. Plus, these private label items don't just come from thin air. There are a lot of brands behind popular Aldi items that supply the store with a version of their products, which Aldi then brands under its own names. Don't be tempted by the products you know.

Walk through any Aldi aisle, and you'll likely see a lot of boxes. A big reason why Aldi manages to keep its prices low is that it's looking for time-efficiency savings everywhere, including how the employees stock the shelves. Instead of wasting time pulling items out and stacking them in an aesthetically-pleasing manner, they just put the packaging the item comes in on the shelf and open it, leaving customers to grab the products straight from the box.

A lot of the time, these boxes are emptied of products and sit there waiting to be broken down. That's when you should strike. Grab the boxes and use them to take your items home instead of paying for a bag at the checkout. The bags that Aldi sells are surprisingly expensive, and these boxes are free. Plus, from personal experience the employees really don't mind you doing this. After all, it means they don't have to find and break down the boxes themselves. If you're unsure, though, just ask before taking the box from the shelves.

If you want to become a money-saving pro at Aldi, then it's time for you to get familiar with its color codes. As you stroll through the aisles, you'll likely notice that the price tags have several different colors. Most of the items have a yellow tag, but fresh produce has a green tag, and white tags usually indicate frozen items. Generally these tags have black text that tells you the name of the item and its price. If, however, an item has a yellow tag but it also has red text, that means the price has been reduced and it's currently on sale, and you should snap it up quickly.

You should also look out for splashes of blue. Blue tags indicate a seasonal product, and while it may not be at a specially-reduced price, it might not stick around for long. As for white tags with red text, these are placed on Aldi Finds products which will likely disappear once they've sold out.

Shopping locally can be harder than it seems. While it's always a great idea to get your produce at farmer's markets or local stores, these can be few and far between, and seasonal offerings might be lacking what you need. All too often, we end up trawling through the aisles of our local supermarket, picking up produce that has been flown in from thousands of miles away.

Well, you'll be pleased to hear that's often not the case at Aldi. The store is (perhaps surprisingly) great at sourcing items locally, proudly displaying its "locally grown" creds on its website. This isn't just good marketing for the company, but also a way for it to keep transport costs down, and to ensure that produce is making it to the stores at peak freshness. Those cheap fruit and veggies are affordable for a reason, folks, and it's not because they're not fresh or tasty. 

If you're aiming for only local, it's always wise to double-check the label for anything you're buying to ensure it's definitely local. While Aldi sources a lot of items from nearby farms, there's always the chance that more exotic produce has been flown in from further afield.

Most people know by now that Aldi is German, and a big clue is the kind of items it often sells in its stores. Dotted between the more standard products, you might find bars of German chocolate, delectable Christmas stollen loaves, and large bottles of glühwein to ring in the holiday spirit. It's important to remember that while these products proudly celebrate the store's German origins, they're also a good way to experience more European tastes at a way more reasonable price than you'd find elsewhere.

Plus, these products are good, folks. Aldi's German chocolate is especially tasty, with a rich, buttery flavor that puts other candies to shame — and it's offered at a seriously reasonable price. As such, we'd always recommend going for the German brands at Aldi stores wherever possible. You'll get a more unique product, and you'll likely make a saving while doing so.