Aldi, the UK’s cheapest supermarket, is well known for its popular middle aisle, but it’s far from just Specialbuys that are a hit with shoppers.
With spring on the way, Aldi’s managing director of buying, Julie Ashfield, has revealed five secrets behind the success of its flowers section.
- “We won’t be beaten on price”
We know how special it is to give flowers to a loved one – or yourself – and we believe that everyone deserves to enjoy that special treat, without breaking the bank.
That’s why you can pick up a bouquet at Aldi for even less than the price of a takeaway coffee, at just £3.22 on average. We’re also proud to offer the best value flowers on the market.
One of the secrets to keeping our prices low lies in our long-term partnership with Yorkshire-based JZ Flowers, who have supplied our flowers for 35 years, with 82 million British stems sold last year alone.
- “We’re always tapping into trends”
To make sure shoppers can have their pick of the bunch, we have dedicated teams monitoring the market and a design team looking at upcoming trends.
We’re expecting another big year for tulips in 2025 and JZ Flowers has partnered with British tulip growers, to provide us with more than 10 million gorgeous British tulips throughout the year.
We also know that our shoppers always look for bright and colourful bouquets as we approach the change in seasons, so customers can find daffodils and spring posy bouquets in stores now, and our beautiful ranunculus which are due to launch in stores soon.
- “We always make sure we have what you need”
So that you can always find your favourite flowers to give to your loved ones, we work closely with JZ Flowers to ensure our shelves are fully stocked during key seasonal moments such as Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day.
In the lead up to key moments like Mother’s Day, we also significantly increase the number of flower deliveries to store, JZ Flowers supplies around 2 million bunches per week for Aldi in a typical Mother’s Day week.
- “We know what shoppers love”
Our most popular bouquet throughout the year is our £3.99 medium mixed bouquet, but our shoppers’ favourites change a lot with the seasons.
In summer, peonies are a firm customer favourite and our British sweet williams perform extremely well in the warmer seasons too. We also find that sunflowers are especially popular with Aldi customers and are a standout success every year.
Our newly introduced mono bouquets were a huge hit with customers last year, particularly our British winter tulips and our British gladioli.
- “You’ll always know where to find our flowers”
We want to ensure a consistent shopping experience for customers, so all our stores deliberately follow a similar layout.
This means shoppers will always find our flowers section at the front of the store, making it easier for customers to find what they’re looking for, no matter which store they visit.
While we do love consistency, we’re also committed to making changes wherever we can to reduce our plastic packaging and we’re currently transitioning to use a 70% recycled plastic sleeve for our bouquets.
Our tulips, chrysanthemums, alstroemeria and medium mixed bouquets are in the process of being transitioned to 70% recycled plastic sleeves, once completed this is expected to remove a total of 195 tonnes of virgin plastic from the range.
