According to the German magazine Wirtschaftswoche the foodstuff discounters, who for a long time were known as very inexpensive by consumers, have increased their prices by more than the average. "Taken over the entire year prices have increased by about 4.5 percent" the magazine cites the result of research by Nurnburg institute of consumer research (GfK).
In supermarkets prices increased by on average 2.1 percent. In the total foodstuff trade the general increase in price was 2.8 percent. Because of their low profit margins discounters, such as Aldi and Lidl were forced to include the "partly massively increased raw material cost in their selling prices" the magazine quotes the trade experts of GfK. Coffee was one of the biggest price increasers.
Over the last year the market shares of Aldi and Lidl in the German food trade decreased again 0.2 percent to 43.4 percent, as announced by FOCUS, using data of GfK. In 2008 the market share of the discounters was still 44.5 percent.