Since the dawn of Amazon, online shipping has exploded worldwide, and today most companies have an online presence. Even traditionally brick-and-mortar stores like Walmart, Target, Best Buy, and Costco allow customers to buy from home and either have products shipped to the store or directly to your doorstep.
What about Aldi? After all, the grocer does sell some rather unique stuff. We know this is a question for some customers, as we sometimes get emails asking us if they can order Aldi products online or if Aldi ships products to people’s homes. (Sometimes the people who send those emails think we’re Aldi.)
So here’s the rundown.
Can I Order an Aldi Product I Can’t Find in Stores?
No, you can’t.
If you want a specific product that you once saw at Aldi, or you saw Aldi advertise it a while back, and now you can’t find it anymore, that product was most likely an Aldi Find or a Seasonal Item.
- Aldi Finds are products that are only sold for a limited time, and they tend to be related to the time of year — exercise equipment in January, camping gear in the spring and summer, cookware and kitchen gadgets around the holidays, etc. Stores get one shipment of these Aldi Finds, and once they sell out, that’s it and they’re gone. Sometimes items sell out in a few days, or it can be as quickly as a few hours or as long as a few weeks.
- Seasonal Items stick around in stores for longer than an Aldi Find, but they’re only stocked for a few months and then they disappear until the next year. They include products such as pumpkin cake rolls in the fall and barbecue sauces in the spring and summer. These items do get restocked a few times, but not indefinitely.
The key thing to know here is that if a product is an Aldi Find or a Seasonal Item, once it’s gone from your local store, it’s gone, and it’s not available for online ordering either.
Does Aldi Ship Products Through the Post Office or Another Mail Carrier?
In most places, the answer is no.
Aldi in the United States does not offer a way to order products via its website or to ship products to homes. Aldi Ireland doesn’t either. Neither does Aldi Australia, except for SIM cards sold as part of its prepaid phone service.
One exception is if you live in the U.K. Aldi in the United Kingdom does ship products to homes there, with free delivery on items over £20. This includes many of the company’s Specialbuys, which are Aldi UK’s name for Aldi Finds. Of course, the United Kingdom isn’t as big as, say, the United States: the entire U.K. — England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland — is roughly the same size as Wyoming, so it’s a lot easier to ship things in the U.K. than it is the U.S.
Another exception is China, which Aldi started serving in 2017. In fact, Aldi began as an online-only operation in China; at press time, there are 23 Aldi stores in China. China is a much bigger country than the United Kingdom, so Aldi seems to have a much different business strategy there than in other places.
Are There Other Ways To Get Aldi Products Delivered to Your Home?
In the United States, the short answer is yes, but only for certain products, and there are exceptions regarding limited-time Aldi Finds and Seasonal Items. Aldi contracts with Instacart for home deliveries, so shoppers can buy Aldi products on Instacart and an Instacart shopper will deliver those groceries to a person’s home.
There are a couple of catches, though. One, Instacart charges more for Aldi products and has fees on top of that, so you’ll pay significantly more than you would if you drove there and shopped for yourself. Two, Instacart does not easily allow you to purchase Aldi Finds. However, some customers report that you can put in a request for your shopper to keep an eye out for specific Aldi Finds and add them to your order, but you have to know exactly what you want and it has to be currently in stock at Aldi.
In other words, while you can get your milk through Instacart, you might still have to go get a pressure cooker yourself. To add to that last point, Instacart can only deliver products that are actually on the shelves at your local Aldi store. So if you’re looking for a way to get your hands on a special that you can no longer find in stores, Instacart can’t help you either.
Closing Thoughts:
Although Aldi isn’t afraid to innovate in some ways, in other ways it remains a pretty old-school operation. For that reason, Aldi in the U.S. doesn’t offer online ordering through its website, and they won’t ship their Aldi Find products through the postal service. The only exceptions are if you happen to live in the United Kingdom or China, where Aldi operations there do offer shipping.
That said, when it comes to food, Aldi does offer home delivery through Instacart. Unfortunately, Instacart prices are often more expensive than in-store prices, and there are additional fees. What’s more, Instacart does not easily offer a way to order limited-time Aldi Finds, and they can’t deliver products that are not currently in stock at your local Aldi store.
And that’s why I no longer shop Aldi at all….. too archaic for me and their prices are now higher than most local grocery stores closer to me.