The Market Report

It's no secret that groceries are expensive. And everyone seems to want to save money when they shop. But how expensive really is your supermarket? Well, I did the math. I compared prices on a sample basket of 50 items across more than 30 supermarkets in the northeast region to see how they stack up. The highest and lowest definitely weren't a surprise: ALDI comes in at just $257 for the order, while the same basket is $429 at Kings. Here's what I notice looking at these prices: Discount stores offer the best prices -- if you're willing to compromise.  The discounters I checked for this comparison, ALDI and LIDL, were the cheapest for the overall basket. But they also had a more limited selection, and more substitutions. You can save big by shopping there, but be prepared to not get exactly what you were looking for. Walmart and Hannaford are good choices for a full selection but low prices.  Walmart and Hannaford had nearly everything on the list, and low everyday pric...

Whole Foods Market Opened:  2016 Owner:  Amazon Previous Tenants:  Market Basket (mid/late 1980s-2015) Cooperative:  none Location:  160 Littleton Rd, Westford, MA Photographed:  August 19, 2024 Whole Foods. Where do I start? It's been a while since I've posted a Whole Foods, partially because there aren't that many in this part of the state. And Whole Foods is just, well, a complicated store for me to talk about. It's been under the ownership of Amazon for several years now, and whether related to the Amazon ownership or not, they've made some pretty significant changes over the last few years. Their prices -- although still high -- are now much closer to some competitors. I am almost always happy with the 365 brand, which is frequently competitive with any other organic brand out there. But at the same time, the stores have lost some of their personality, and more concerningly, they tend to be worse-run these days. I'm seeing more empty shelves, messy di...

Market Basket Opened: 2012 Owner:  DeMoulas family Previous Tenants:  none Cooperative:  none Location:  6 Cornerstone Sq, Westford, MA Photographed:  May 15, 2024 It's only fair warning that, as we travel through this part of the state, we'll be seeing a lot of Market Basket. The chain of about 90 stores is headquartered right nearby in Tewksbury, and the Lowell area is their home turf. Because of that, there are some older stores that remain around here (such as this one just under 20 miles west). But at the same time, as I've mentioned, Market Basket is pretty serious about updating their stores. Here in Westford, a new-build location opened in 2012, more or less replacing a location diagonally across the street -- although that store remained in business until 2015. This one is just a tiny bit larger than the Littleton location we saw on Monday, by about 2000 square feet. This location is around 67,000 square feet, a pretty typical size for a Market Baske...

Donelan's Fresh Market Opened: 2021 under current ownership; 1957 previously Owner:  Gohal and Mohanbhai Patel Previous Tenants:  none Cooperative:  none Location:  236 Great Rd, Littleton, MA Photographed:  October 9, 2021 and December 10, 2023 We recently saw the Pepperell Quality Market , and in that post I mentioned that the owners of that store acquired the Donelan's chain after buying that location around 2020. The four-store chain started here in Littleton back in 1948 , eventually building today's Littleton Donelan's in 1957 and expanding and renovating several times, most recently expanded in the 1970s and renovated in the early 00s or so. Following the sale of the chain, the new owners rebranded slightly to Donelan's Fresh Market, with a slightly new logo. The picture below shows the store in December 2023 post-rebrand; the rest of these pictures come from October 2021. Today, the store is around 40,000 square feet, quite a bit smaller than the Marke...