One of the things we pride ourselves on in our house is saving money and living frugally, but not sacrificing on quality. I wanted to determine if there was a significant difference in quality between the Cheetos and Aldi brand Crunchy Cheese Curls. We keep these around the house for the occasional snack or for sandwich night.
During my normal grocery trip I was able to purchase Cheetos on sale for $.99 which ironically is the regular price of the Aldi brand. What I found interesting though was the difference in size between the two. The Aldi brand is 11oz, while the Cheetos were 10 1/4oz (this bag is normally 8.5oz, but this bag bragged 20% more). I placed the Cheetos and Aldi brand cheese curls in two identical bowls. They looked so similar that I had to mark them. I had our daughters and my husband come in one by one separately and taste each, give their opinions on the characteristics of both and then of course try to guess which one was the name brand.
The first thing they all noticed was that the the two products do closely resemble each other but that the Aldi brand had a cheesier appearance. My husband said he would probably have mistaken the Aldi brand for the name brand because of the slightly brighter appearance. Tasting the two brands resulted in the opinion being given that neither chip being more superior than the other. The only difference noted in taste was that the Cheetos seemed to have a buttery flavor. As a bonus and something I didn’t realize until after I conducted the test, the Aldi brand has fewer calories and less fat for an identical serving of Cheetos. What I really wanted to discover with this fun family exercise was if my family could tell the difference between the two products and if they really cared enough to tell me that they didn’t want the private label brand. The usual savings between the two items is fairly significant (anywhere between 50% and 75%). The results showed me and the rest of our family that the differences between a name brand and private label brand are very slight and probably not enough in most cases to warrant spending more for the name brand.
Tags: Aldi, Taste Test
[...] One source of contention that many shoppers come up against, is the unwillingness of their family to try a different brand. Sometimes it is the packaging that keeps your family from trying a new brand since many people associate store brand products as being inferior. Try a blind taste test with your family, and see if they can tell the difference. We did this with Aldi Cheese Curls versus Cheetos. [...]