Trivia Time: Trader Joes and ALDI in the US are not owned by same company. Suspect they (along with WalMart, Sams Costco, etc.) get their dead cows, chickens and pigs from same large-scale US suppliers though. Like 'em both.
Interesting history,
CNBC explains Aldi was originally founded as a suburban German corner store which brothers Karl and Theo Albrecht inherited after World War II. In the economic turmoil of post-war Germany, the brothers worked to cut down waste by only selling staples at low prices and were quickly able to expand their store into a chain. By 1955 they had 100 stores, but in the 1960s, the brothers split the business into two (Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd) after disagreeing about selling cigarettes.
While the two brands coexist regionally in Germany — divided between the north (Nord) and south (Süd) — they split the rest of continental Europe into territories. Aldi Nord operates in France, the Netherlands, Spain, Belgium, Denmark, Poland, Luxembourg, and Portugal, while Aldi Süd services the United Kingdom, Hungary, Switzerland, Austria, Ireland, Slovenia, and Italy, as well as Australia. Aldi Süd expanded into the U.S. in 1976, three years before Aldi Nord bought Trader Joe's, making the U.S. the only country besides Germany where both companies compete.
Although Aldi Nord does operate Trader Joe's in the U.S., the brands are run separately and are a completely different company than the Aldi we know in the States, even if some of their products and target markets overlap.
