AUSTRALIA | Consumer group CHOICE has released the latest results of its quarterly survey of supermarket prices across Australia.
This quarter, in addition to comparing prices of base items that will be tracked throughout the year, CHOICE also assessed the freshness of strawberries and compared a basket of home-brand goods across Aldi, Coles, IGA, and Woolworths.
The home-brand basket consisted of cream cheese, thickened cream, puff pastry, frozen mixed berries, tomato paste, spaghetti, tomato sauce, and soy milk.
“While we know people typically buy a mix of branded and home-brand products at the supermarket - you might be a dedicated Weetbix fan, but have no issue buying a pack of home-brand pasta - we often get asked how much money you can save by buying exclusively the cheapest products. So, this quarter, we assessed the price of eight home-brand products at Aldi, Coles, IGA, and Woolworths,” said CHOICE Editorial Director, Mark Serrels.
“Our basket of eight home-brand items included a mix of fridge, freezer, and shelf products from each of the supermarket’s own-brand range. At IGA, for example, that was either Black & Gold or Community Co. When we compared home-brand baskets without specials, Aldi was the cheapest at AUD 20.08. They were followed by Coles at AUD 21.30, Woolworths at AUD 21.40, and IGA at AUD 23.89. When including specials, prices stayed the same everywhere except IGA, where it fell by five cents to AUD 23.84."
As part of this quarter’s survey, CHOICE also assessed the freshness of strawberries, surveying 19 to 25 punnets from each of the four supermarkets.
Shoppers were asked to assess the state of the strawberries on day one and again on day five, storing them in their original packaging in the crisper drawer of their fridge.
Serrels said that in the freshness assessment of strawberries, Coles was the winner, with 100 percent of punnets showing no signs of decay on day one. Woolworths came in next with 92 percent, followed by Aldi at 75 per cent, and IGA at 50 percent.
By day five, Coles was still in front when it came to strawberry freshness, with 58 percent of punnets containing fruit with no signs of decay. 44 percent of Woolworths punnets contained fruit without signs of decay, and Aldi was fairly evenly matched at 45 percent. Of punnets purchased from IGA, only 25 percent had no signs of decay after five days.
For the full basket of 15 items, excluding specials, Aldi came in the cheapest at AUD 55.34. They were followed by Coles at AUD 56.75, Woolworths at AUD 57.20, and IGA at AUD 65.56.
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