Want to know Australia’s BEST supermarket?
We surveyed 2800 Australians about everything from checkout speed to value for money at ALDI Australia, Coles, Costco, Foodland, FoodWorks, Harris Farm Markets, IGA Australia or Woolworths to reveal the best and worst supermarkets for 2019.
Which one is your favourite, and why?
Is Choice planning to do another supermarket price survey? I see that the previous one is about 2 years old and there has been a lot of changes in the industry over this time. I have noticed that through product unit prices from individual product testing by Choice, that there has been price changes between retailers.
While I don’t have any hard dates, I understand that we will be doing more work on pricing and basket prices 
I’m sorry to be missing out on the best supermarkets in Australia: there’s no Harris Farm Markets nor Foodland stores in Melbourne 
I have recently attended Costco and while there are many bargains to be found there, there are some really big traps as well. I think some people equate the amount in a bulk size means savings but when you really compare unit for unit the difference can be starkly different to the perception. As I have said in the past many times we buy with our eyes (what we see influences our “value” system rather than the real calculated cost).
I also found it to be very busy and quite packed out and for anyone who stresses in those situations the benefits are quickly overshadowed by the impact of the congestion. Take a calculator/smartphone, know the prices of the things you want in comparison to what you would pay elsewhere and don’t get swept up in the thrill. I wouldn’t rate it higher than some of the others in the list, perhaps at par but mostly below my other shopping experiences.
Signage of sections in Costco is also not very clear but I would assume that after a few trips it would become clearer to a veteran user.
Addendum: Costco markets itself as “Wholesale” but many of the products are close to or at retail prices and close to what someone could buy at any shop…if you hoped you got all wholesale pricing by buying at Costco you very well may be disappointed by the actual price you pay for many items.
Petrol price was very good though, $1.497 per litre for 98 Premium as at 14th May 2019 compared to around $1.90 elsewhere in Ipswich. You can only pay by using a debit or credit card and you must be a member of Costco so you would need to buy regularly to offset the yearly membership if that was your reason for joining.
When our son and his family were living in Orange, he absolutely loved Harris Farm Markets for the range and quality of their offering and some great markdowns.
He would quite often get packs of 6 fresh quails marked down to haff price and other gourmet items
This is useful, but I don’t see how you can include chains which only operate in one of two States in an Australia-wide survey. In addition, as Costco’s prices are often low that’s only for goods purchased in bulk and there is a membership fee for Costco which should somehow be integrated into the prices.
My experience of Aldi is a good and happy one, both for prices and for the quality of service at the checkouts. I would have ranked them higher than Costco (where my experience of service has been abysmal) and as I wouldn’t have included Harris Farms or Foodland in the results I would have put Aldi first.
@grahroll’s post above is right on the money.
An additional point about Costco is they, like Aldi, have some products that are killer deals, often American origin but also Japanese or local, from groceries to hardware to household to electronics. It is hit and miss luck, but as examples a year or two back we bought an Electrolux hand vac for about 1/2 the best price we could find elsewhere; my hearing aides were about 30% of comparable local supply; and last visit there they had a small supply of some wonderful commercial grade electric sandwich grill/presses that although quite dear were still much less than our ‘open market’ prices. We bought a dear Japanese wok for a gift and except it was Very Expensive it felt pretty special so went with it. Turns out it might be The Best Wok in The World and was about half price compared to other sources. Even found a company that appears to buy select things from Costco, marks them up and resells them - no membership required - and the products are still cheaper than most other sources.
You can also walk in and pay more for products than you could buy them from regular sales if you don’t keep track.
As for customer service, never had a problem and anyone approached on the floor will help or arrange help through their mobiles. Crowds? At the wrong time they can be epic, but at other times one can virtually have the store to themselves, like most other places. Costcos are big, and the crowds can be equally big.
Last point is that we have found most products we would buy there are roughly priced with the locals better sale prices, but every day. We watch prices and shop accordingly at all of them.
I’ve started buying my vegies at Aldi. I hadnt been doing any shopping there but was in for a particular thing one day and thought I would pick up some veg so I would not have to go to Coles, or drive a couple of suburbs away to get to the F&V. Imagine my amazement at the quality and freshness of those vegies. As they depleted I went back to my usual, and imagine even more amazement as the crisp carrots from Aldi were still fresher than the newer ones purchased from Coles. Same applied to potatoes and zucchini.
This is why for some of the prepackaged products…
I was buying loose veg, because I cant eat the quantity contained in prepacks before they go off. I did get a prepacked “asian salad” which was quite nice, but they only last a couple of days anyway. I suppose they are made with leftovers of unsold cabbage, onion etc
Ah but was the sale of ‘illegal drugs’ taken into account with these ratings?
This has to be a deliberate joke, but who knows given the world these days.
The guy must be an idiot
Definitely a joke 
Could be, but what does it say about the joker (whoever it might be behind or in front of the curtain)? a) it is a pretty poorly constructed joke, b) he has a bad sense of humour, or c) he is really fairly dull yet probably is a voter, or d) All of the above. I go with d.
D, yes … and this is from 2015 or so 
I cannot understand why Costco charge membership and as you say very little saved, isnt it just an American giant trying to get into Australia. Just like Amazon. Actually Amazon price are shocking when i purchase soneone time its my last time ill buy through Amazon.
If you buy the wrong things indeed you can save very little, if you watch what you buy then you can definitely save. We had to purchase a new washing machine, the model we bought through Costco saved us about $400 on the best price I could find elsewhere (that’s a saving about 6 and 1/2 times our annual membership). The price included delivery which the ‘elsewhere’ one needed a delivery charge. The delivery people placed it where I wanted it inside the house, all part of the service they said.
Over the past year we saved about 3 times our membership fee in petrol savings alone, new tyres saved us about $200 and when one was punctured it was repaired for free as is the policy. Car Battery was far cheaper than elsewhere as well saving us about $50 on anywhere else.
Stressors in Store are still tight crowds particularly weekends, so we now know that Monday or Tuesday are the days to use to avoid the congestion at our Store, this may vary Store by Store.
Free Hearing tests, and Optometrist as well, is part of the membership.
So like I said take a calculator or Smartphone, know the prices and keep to the shopping list. Pizzas are value for money, they are the larger Family sizes of yesteryear, well lavished with toppings and at about $16 each are a bargain. Chicken, Corned Beef, Beef Mince and some Pork is good pricing but other Beef and Lamb in general is very expensive but are prime product.
Ok. I saw a guy on YouTube purchased a pizza it was as massive as you say. I guess uts a relative. In regards to battery life car ones are way overpriced and usually can’t be reused because most are sealed compare to before where could be repaired. As one battery gjy said that is manufacture for you making money. Just like everything else.
Hearing aids are about 1/2 the cost of audiologists for comparable devices. I saved 3x the annual membership buying a single rechargeable vac 2 years ago. Just two examples.
As @grahroll noted, everythng is not ‘a deal’ but if you pay attention you can get excellent ‘deals’ and Costco every day prices tend to be a bit lower than other shops although for food items the packages are big to huge more often than not. The quality for Costco meats is mostly superb.
One needs to pay attention. Plus if one is near a Costco petrol you can easily save the annual membership and then some, on that alone.
