Mary Porter, a longtime local, discovered what she saw as a retail miracle in plain sight when she entered Manhattan’s newest Aldi store looking for deals: a $4 jar of almond butter that costs $22 in her own neighborhood. Porter, 79, told the BBC, “I thought I would come and check it out because Aldi has a reputation for being inexpensive, and by golly, it is amazing,” marveling at the savings in addition to the organic raspberries and fresh spinach that filled her basket.
The storefront is nestled away in an underground parking lot below, entirely hidden from the unassuming onlooker. The Ellery is a high-end apartment building with monthly rent starting at around $5,000 (£3,725).
In contrast, the building’s own website highlights more expensive local options like Whole Foods and Brooklyn Fare, leaving out the store entirely from its carefully curated online neighborhood guide.
But the silence vanishes as soon as you enter the basement, past the opulent exterior. The brilliantly illuminated, busy area hums with tremendous energy even on an early Tuesday afternoon in July as a lunchtime swarm of New Yorkers cram themselves into the small aisles carrying enormous canvas bags.
Porter’s findings are part of Aldi’s $9 billion US development strategy, which aims to open 800 new locations over the course of five years, with a focus on densely populated areas like Manhattan. For the German supermarket, which made its debut in the US in 1976 and has since expanded to almost 2,800 locations, it represents a significant scale-up.
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