This post is an open thread.
My daughters — and before them my wife — have long been fascinated by American Girl dolls. American Girl was launched in 1986 by Pleasant Rowland, who ran the company before selling it to toy giant Mattel in 1998 for the tidy sum of $700 million. I’m mostly a bystander to the family’s American Girl interests, but I am known to make the occasional joke about how American Girl accessories frequently cost more than the real-life products they imitate. “Why not,” I might quip, “buy a real grilled cheese sandwich when you can get a fake one for $30?” I’m only half-kidding.
Aldi isn’t in the American Girl business — although it did take a stab at 18-inch dolls several years ago — but the grocer does roll out the occasional toy or toy accessory as part of its rotating limited buys. One of the more clever examples in recent years is a line of play items meant to imitate … Aldi itself, right down to the brands. You can, for instance, sometimes buy a play Aldi market. You can get your own little kid-sized Aldi cart.
And you can even get some pretend Aldi food to add to your kid shopping experience.
What We Know:
The three different sets for sale. (Click to enlarge.)
The Bee Happy Aldi Play Shopping Set (Product Code: 706282) is an Aldi Find. That means it’s only in stores for a short time. Once it’s sold out, you won’t be able to find it until it comes back, whenever that might be. You can’t order this online if it’s sold out at your local store. (Instead, you’ll have to settle for getting real Aldi food instead of toy versions.)
At post time, this set comes in three varieties, and each set each cost $12.99. That’s $2 less than Aldi sold the sets for in 2022 and 2023.
According to Aldi, all of the sets are made from FSC-certified wood and are Aldi-branded. The three sets include:
- The wallet and basket set. This set includes an Aldi-branded shopping basket made of FSC-certified wood, an Aldi wallet, and accessories such as play bills, coins, and cards.
- The grocery set. It comes with a large assortment of different branded ALDI foods such as canned goods, cereals, bread, cheese, and many more “for a realistic shopping play experience.”
- The food crates and bag set. It includes an Aldi-branded shopping bag and FSC-certified wooden crates with an assorted variety of vegetables and fruits.
Each of them are sold separately.
What We Don’t Know:
We haven’t tested out these toys, so we don’t know how good the build quality is, including how well they hold up to kid play. We’ve created this open thread for users to share their experiences.
Have you tried out these toys? Let us know about them in the comments.
