Aldi's high-end Specially Selected range is outpacing other products in growth, a pattern that's becoming common across the broader grocery market as well. Aldi's UK boss suggests customers are becoming more inclined to indulge themselves while staying in to eat, trading up to premium own-label products such as Wagyu steak, luxury cheese, ready meals and brioche buns. In fact, due to a shift towards home celebrations, this year Aldi's Specially Selected range will constitute over 50% of its overall Christmas offering for the first time, reports the MEN .
With this in mind, we decided to compare these products with those of Marks and Spencer, sampling some of Aldi's most popular Specially Selected items. Now, M&S is renowned for the high quality of its food and has recently been causing a stir with its own Remarksable range, which has been winning over shoppers with its low prices. However, it still ranks among the priciest for many groceries outside of that range, so we wanted to see how they stack up in terms of price and taste.
Steaks and burgers Despite the unavailability of Wagyu steaks in the Aldi stores we visited, possibly due to their popularity, we decided to try fillet steaks from both retailers. Aldi offers a 28-day matured fillet steak, weighing 170g, for £4.99, while M&S sells a 10-day matured fillet steak, weighing 190g, for £8.
This equates to £7.16 for the same size as Aldi's offering. Both were scrumptious, but it was the Aldi steak that impressed us with .