Aldi gains more market share, and Coles narrows Woolworths gap

European supermarket chain ALDI continues to go from strength to strength in Australia, quadrupling…

European supermarket chain ALDI continues to go from strength to strength in Australia, quadrupling its customer base over the last eight years from under a million to 4.2 million people shopping there in an average four week period, according to new findings from market research organisation Roy Morgan Research.

While this falls a long way short of the 8.8 million customers shopping at Coles supermarkets or the 9.5 million at Woolworths supermarkets, ALDI’s long-term gains in terms of market share indicate that European supermarket chain is “on the up and up”, according to Roy Morgan Research.

“Despite the long-standing dominance of Coles and Woolworths, ALDI has shown that it’s not a two-horse race,” said Warren Reid, Group Account Manager Consumer Products, Roy Morgan Research. “More importantly, ALDI’s popularity also suggests that there are opportunities for other international supermarket giants to successfully enter the Australian grocery market,” he said.

Woolworths maintains its lead, but gap is closing

As of December 2013, Roy Morgan Research’s Supermarket Currency report placed ALDI in the Top 3 of supermarkets in terms of market share. Accounting for 10.3 per cent of all grocery dollars, ALDI surpassed even IGA (9.5 per cent). At 39 per cent, Woolworths still maintained the largest slice of the pie, while Coles continued to improve, achieving its highest market-share proportion since March 2008 at 33.5 per cent.

“While ALDI’s increase in market share over the last eight years may seem like a slow burn, they’ve actually secured a sizable chunk of the $82 billion grocery market,” Mr Reid said. “It’s not that Metcash/IGA are any less important to consider, but they haven’t made the same kind of gains over the last few years,” he said.

“Despite Woolworths posting above-average sales in their last quarter, this hasn’t had any noticeable impact on their market share, as Coles continues to close the gap, and ALDI continues to grow,” Mr Reid said.