Aldi unveils plans to take the supermarket battle to its rivals

THE boss of Aldi has outlined aggressive expansion plans that could see the German supermarket open more than 1,000 new stores.

In an interview with industry magazine The Grocer, Matthew Barnes said Aldi could open up to eight shops in some British towns, piling more pressure on its rivals.

“If you look at the population, we think not only could we have a store in every town and city, but for every 25,000 to 30,000 people,” he said.

Aldi currently has 700 British outlets and, based on Mr Barnes’ calculations, this could increase to 2,600 as part of the firm’s expansion plan.

Such an expansion would see Aldi go toe to toe with Tesco, which has around 2,700 supermarkets and convenience stores in the country.

Mr Barnes added that he expects Aldi to grow quicker than its 2022 target of 1,000 stores, with the total closer to 1,300.

“We have 700 stores now and 300 sites already approved on our books. And there are 600 town locations where we don’t have a store, in many of which we could easily have two, three or four stores ... We don’t have a store in Watford [but] that would be a six to eight Aldi town.”

The emergence of Aldi and fellow German grocer Lidl shook the socalled Big Four – Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons – who remain locked in a bitter price war.

Figures out last month showed the duo hit record high market share and now have a collective 11.7% share of the market. In February Aldi overtook the Co-operative to become Britain’s fifth-largest grocer.