Aldi (stylised as ALDI) is the common company brand name of two German multinational family-owned discount supermarket chains operating over 12,000 stores in 19 countries. The chain was founded by brothers Karl and Theo Albrecht in 1946, when they took over their mother's store in Essen. The business was split into two separate groups in 1960, that later became Aldi Nord, headquartered in Essen, and Aldi Süd, headquartered in Mülheim.
In 1962, they introduced the name Aldi (a syllabic abbreviation for Albrecht Diskont), which is pronounced . In Germany, Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd have been financially and legally separate since 1966, although both divisions' names may appear as if they were a single enterprise with certain store brands or when negotiating with contractor companies. The formal business name of Aldi Nord is Aldi Einkauf GmbH & Co., while the formal business name of Aldi Süd is ALDI SÜD Dienstleistungs-SE & Co. Each company is owned and operated independently, but they do have contractual business with one another.
Aldi's German operations consist of Aldi Nord's 35 individual regional companies with about 2,200 stores in western, northern, and eastern Germany, and Aldi Süd's 32 regional companies with 2,000 stores in western and southern Germany. Internationally, Aldi Nord operates in Belgium, Denmark, France, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal and Spain, while Aldi Süd operates in Australia, Austria, China, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Slovenia, Switzerland, United Kingdom and United States. Only in Austria and Slovenia Aldi operates the stores under the Hofer brand. Aldi Nord also owns the Trader Joe's grocery chain in the United States which operates separately from the group. Aldi Süd announced in August 2023 that it will buy 400 Winn-Dixie and Harveys supermarkets in the southern United States.
History
Karl and Theo Albrecht's mother opened a small store in a suburb of Essen, Germany, in 1913. Their father was employed as a miner and later as a baker's assistant. Karl and Theo were born in 1920 and 1922 respectively. Theo Albrecht completed an apprenticeship in his mother's store, while Karl Albrecht worked in a delicatessen.
Karl Albrecht took over a food shop formerly run by F. W. Judt and later served in the German Army during World War II. In 1945, the brothers took over their mother's business and soon opened another retail outlet nearby. By 1950, the Albrecht brothers owned 13 stores in the Ruhr Valley.
The brothers' idea was to subtract the legal maximum rebate of 3% before sale. The market leaders at the time, which often were co-operatives, required their customers to collect rebate stamps and to send them at regular intervals to reclaim their money. The Albrecht brothers also rigorously removed merchandise that did not sell from their shelves, cutting costs by neither advertising nor selling fresh produce and keeping the size of their retail outlets small.
Split
The brothers split the company in 1960, over a dispute about whether they should sell cigarettes. Karl believed they would attract shoplifters while his brother did not. At the time, they jointly owned 300 shops with a cash flow of DM90 million yearly. In 1962, they introduced the name Aldi—short for Albrecht-Diskont, which translates into English as "Albrecht Discount". Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd have been financially and legally separate since 1966.
The individual groups were originally owned and managed jointly by the brothers. After the death of Theo's son Berthold, Aldi Nord continues to be controlled by the Albrecht family through its Markus, Lukas and Jakobus foundations, which hold a combined 80.5 per cent of the company's issued capital.
International expansion
Aldi started to expand internationally in 1967, when Aldi Süd acquired the grocery chain Hofer in Austria; Aldi Nord opened its first stores abroad in the Netherlands in 1973, and other countries followed. In 1976, Aldi Süd opened its first store in the United States in Iowa, and, in 1979, Aldi Nord acquired Trader Joe's. After German reunification and the fall of the Iron Curtain, Aldi experienced a rapid expansion. The brothers retired as CEOs in 1993; control of the companies was placed in the hands of private family foundations, the Siepmann Foundation (Aldi Süd) and the Markus, Jakobus and Lukas Foundation (Aldi Nord, Trader Joe's).
Acquisition of Winn-Dixie/Harvey’s
On August 16, 2023, ALDI Süd entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Winn-Dixie and Harveys Supermarket, including approximately 400 stores across Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, and Mississippi.