There used to be a pecking order to grocery stores. You had the nicer ones, the regular ones, and then No Frills at the bottom as the cheap option. When I first moved to Toronto, I didn’t even consider it.
Grocery prices have changed that. Now it seems that No Frills is the norm, the place you start, because everywhere else costs more. And even there, it doesn’t feel like you’re saving much, despite the name.
Which leaves the question of what the discount store is now.
For anyone not from Canada, No Frills is a grocery chain that built its name on being the discount option, and the name pretty much says it all. If you’re in the US, think somewhere in Aldi territory: plain stores and a lot of the store’s own brand on the shelves.
The frills keep disappearing anyway. Packing your own bags never went away after the pandemic, and a lot of the checkouts are now self-serve, with staff milling around nearby. I’m doing the scanning and the bagging (in my own bags), and nobody’s taking anything off the bill for the help.
The shelves look a lot thinner, and since renovations that many stores have had, the aisles are narrower.
There is room, though, for a lot of PC and Loblaw merchandise, including a full aisle of cookware and small furniture.
That’s part of why the whole thing feels a bit like a bait and switch. No Frills is owned by Loblaw, the biggest grocery company in Canada, the same company behind Loblaws, Superstore, Fortinos, Zehrs, and Shoppers Drug Mart. For American readers, it’s a bit like Kroger owning Food 4 Less.
So when grocery prices push people out of Loblaws and into No Frills, they’re still spending their money with the same company. To be fair, No Frills is still cheaper than Loblaws. But a lot of what’s on the shelves is the same No Name and PC stuff with a different sign out front.
Loblaw has been pretty open about where this is going, too. Its CEO said this month he expects discount stores to be more than half of its food business before long.
Food prices are supposed to keep climbing. The big yearly food price report out of Dalhousie figured families would spend up to about a thousand dollars more on food this year than last. That adds up fast with two teenage boys who won’t stop growing.
Unrelated – Who is tired of hearing from The Food Processor? Oh, and if you don’t watch Canadian news and are wondering who the hell is the Food Processor, it’s the guy below. He would be the one talking about the food price report out of Dalhousie.
So I ask my readers, what’s the discount store now? Food Basics? Giant Tiger? I don’t really have an answer. Dollarama has been adding a lot more food, stuff like cereal, canned tuna, and snacks, and by all accounts, business is good. That’s about the only one I can think of.
