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National Brand vs Store Brand

Trader Joe’s store brands rock! The reason everyone loves them

With that being said, cereal and ketchup need to be name brand. Also salad dressing, store brand stuff is usually horrible.

Toiletries (TP, band aids, tissues) are fine being store brand. Also Kirkland golf balls
 
Hellman's mayonnaise, Cabot Cheddar and, Ruffles potato chips! There is no generic/store brand substitute!
 
Usually if it's a stand alone item I go brand, but if it's going in a recipe with a lot of other ingredients I will go generic.
 
Matthew said:
Haven’t really found any difference in most anything. I’ve been in enough food plants to know 99.99% of store brands are the exact same thing as the name brand. There may be a minuscule difference but it ain’t much.
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One thing I have found with peanut butter at Meijer is that on occasion the Meijer brand is more greasy like JIF, but most of the time it is fluffier like Peter Pan. I wonder if they just buy excess from both?
 
Ketchup and Mustard
Sour cream
Mayonnaise

I'm sure there's more, but those immediately came to mind
 
Jman said:
Costco’s Kirkland brand diapers have saved us THOUSANDS with the twins.

Like anything though, there are good house brands...and shite ones.
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TCB2010 said:
yep, diapers is a huge one you can go with the knock offs.
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Nerdy_81 said:
First kid we went almost exclusively Pampers. 2nd kid was Luvs and it saved a ton of money and honestly the diapers were just as good if not better
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Our experience with a boy and a girl was that with our son we really needed Pampers as his equipment was likely to end up being pointed in a variety of directions when he peed and we needed every single bit of absorption in every single spot of the diaper we could get to keep from having leakage. With our daughter the pee always came out of the same spot so any old diaper would do. We did not have Costco when my son was in diapers so I can't compare them to Pampers for a boy, but for a girl I felt like Kirkland diapers were somewhere between Huggies and Pampers but the same price as like Wal-Mart brand so that's what we used exclusively. We could have probably saved quite a bit of money with Kirkland for our son. Buying Pampers all the time sucked royally, especially when we were making entry level incomes.
 
Sometimes off brands surprise you. We went to Aldi once (not my favorite store) and got a few random things like ketchup and tortilla chips and taco seasoning. The taco seasoning was terrible, however my son LOVES the ketchup and my daughter loved their scoops tortilla chips for .89
 
jdtox said:
Sometimes off brands surprise you. We went to Aldi once (not my favorite store) and got a few random things like ketchup and tortilla chips and taco seasoning. The taco seasoning was terrible, however my son LOVES the ketchup and my daughter loved their scoops tortilla chips for .89
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The wife has hit up Aldi a few times recently and you are 100% right. If you don't see the box or bag and pre-judge, some of their items are really good. The tortilla chips are great.
 
Brand name must-haves:
Mountain Dew
Q-Tips

Anything else, I'll give the store brand a shot at some point.
 
DataDude said:
One thing I have found with peanut butter at Meijer is that on occasion the Meijer brand is more greasy like JIF, but most of the time it is fluffier like Peter Pan. I wonder if they just buy excess from both?
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A lot of it is contracted out for manufacturing, building plants ain’t cheap. I’ve seen an awful lot of stuff come through and they just switch the labels in the packaging machine. They’ll load in day 10K labels of X brand & when they’re done packaging, the line keeps running. The mixers/formulators never even know they switched. It’s actually pretty crazy to think about.
Obviously some use different recipes/ingredients but I’d say those are more of an outlier.
I may or may not have seen 2 major carbonated beverage company have 1 plant make all of their syrup. A 3rd leading beverage will use either to make their products, depending on the location of the plant. They rarely even bottle it.
The buyer just seems to associate the name brand with higher quality & justifies the price on the perceived value/quality. I’d bet blind tasting, it’s be hard to tell one from the other. At least as far as food is concerned.
It’s actually really interesting, to me anyways.
 
Nerdy_81 said:
The wife has hit up Aldi a few times recently and you are 100% right. If you don't see the box or bag and pre-judge, some of their items are really good. The tortilla chips are great.
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Exactly. My Mom did quite a bit of shopping at Aldi's. First of all, she was in her 80's and liked a more compact store. Didn't like the big mega stores where shopping them is like the Bataan death march! And I've found some Aldi products that are better than the national brands, or at least as good and a lot less expensive! And they will sometimes have these Wednesday only, while supplies last special, especially on fresh salmon, or rack of lamb. I'm on another forum where guys rave about the lamb they get there.

Matthew said:
A lot of it is contracted out for manufacturing, building plants ain’t cheap. I’ve seen an awful lot of stuff come through and they just switch the labels in the packaging machine. They’ll load in day 10K labels of X brand & when they’re done packaging, the line keeps running. The mixers/formulators never even know they switched. It’s actually pretty crazy to think about.
Obviously some use different recipes/ingredients but I’d say those are more of an outlier.
I may or may not have seen 2 major carbonated beverage company have 1 plant make all of their syrup. A 3rd leading beverage will use either to make their products, depending on the location of the plant. They rarely even bottle it.
The buyer just seems to associate the name brand with higher quality & justifies the price on the perceived value/quality. I’d bet blind tasting, it’s be hard to tell one from the other. At least as far as food is concerned.
It’s actually really interesting, to me anyways.
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True that! Many times I have found the exact same type of packaging, just that the graphics are different. Even when they're not the store brand is still worth a try. Aldi's sausage, egg, and cheese croissant breakfast sandwiches are way better then the Jimmy Dean, and are much less expensive. Sometimes I'll have a need for turkey or beef gravy and don't want to bother making it from scratch. Aldi's "Chefs Cupboard" jarred gravies are light years better than Heinz! Their Boulder brand paper towels are way less expensive and just as good as the national brands. Let me say, that I sometimes can't believe what is being charged for paper products these days! That said, I still have to have my Cottonelle TP. Does a righteous job and you don't have to use a lot, so it lasts!

Oh, I just remembered something. My step-dad worked for a local beer and wine wholesaler, and one time the sales team visited the Duquesne brewery in Pittsburgh. This was back in the day of 3.2 beer. For those of you not old enough to remember that, if you were aged 18 to 21, you could buy and drink 3.2 or "low power" beer. This was bottled under red caps. So called "high power" or 7% beer was bottled under blue caps. While they were being show the bottling line, someone came bolting out of the office yelling that the current run was supposed to be red caps and not blue! A few years later there was a court case here in Ohio where some 19 year old got busted with a 6 pack of so called high power beer. His Dad must have been clued in, because he had the lawyer request or execute a writ asking for one of those bottles from the 6 pack for lab analysis.

Long story short, that bottle tested out at 2.92% alcohol by volume. This was presented in court, and got the kid off since how can you charge him with possession of high power beer when, in fact, it is not. Who cares what color the cap is? This is when Ohio got rid of the 3.2 law since it was unenforceable!
 
Frozen pizza for me. We have tried store brand pizza but it just doesn't cut it for us. Kids don't care, but my palate is more "sophisticated" :cool:
 
Matthew said:
A lot of it is contracted out for manufacturing, building plants ain’t cheap. I’ve seen an awful lot of stuff come through and they just switch the labels in the packaging machine. They’ll load in day 10K labels of X brand & when they’re done packaging, the line keeps running. The mixers/formulators never even know they switched. It’s actually pretty crazy to think about.
Obviously some use different recipes/ingredients but I’d say those are more of an outlier.
I may or may not have seen 2 major carbonated beverage company have 1 plant make all of their syrup. A 3rd leading beverage will use either to make their products, depending on the location of the plant. They rarely even bottle it.
The buyer just seems to associate the name brand with higher quality & justifies the price on the perceived value/quality. I’d bet blind tasting, it’s be hard to tell one from the other. At least as far as food is concerned.
It’s actually really interesting, to me anyways.
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It sure would be interesting to know which major brands make which store brands, but I'm sure it's not something they'd want to get out.
 
Getting older doesn’t have a lot of advantages, but it has a few....
I don’t skimp on food. I buy name brands, and to be honest, I rarely check prices in a supermarket or a pharmacy with vitamins, ibuprofen and the like.
I’m 66, and a few years ago it finally dawned on me... I don’t have to do that anymore. I’m single and at an age and place in my life where I don’t really have to worry about budgeting the way I did when I was younger and raising a family.
I don’t consider myself wealthy, but I have enough that if there is something I want, I can just go buy it, and not worry.
 
Scott F said:
I shop at Aldi pretty regularly. Nearly everything they have is their house brand. The prices are fantastic. The good thing is, they have a great guarantee. Anything you buy that you don’t like they give you your money back. They’ll even replace the item as well as your money back. They only drawback is their selection. If they don’t have what I’m looking for, I buy the name brand at another store.
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Love Aldi products in general. Can't think of a product that I have to have national brand. Maybe ketchup? Probably junk food more than anything (but I've pretty much cut out buying that stuff anyway).

I guess the only thing that comes to mind immediately is soda. Gotta have diet Pepsi or Diet Coke - can't drink the house brands
 
Jman said:
Costco’s Kirkland brand diapers have saved us THOUSANDS with the twins.

Like anything though, there are good house brands...and shite ones.
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Late to the party, but Kirkland diapers (and wipes) are well worth the savings!

For those in states where you can buy liquor at Costco, Kirkland brand bourbon is great.
 
BlueHen2006 said:
Frozen pizza for me. We have tried store brand pizza but it just doesn't cut it for us. Kids don't care, but my palate is more "sophisticated" :cool:
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My teenage son actually prefers the store brand Aldi's frozen pizza (and other cheap store brands from Acme) - even over actual hot take-out pizza. I'm not complaining since it's a heckuva lot cheaper, but - no go for me.
 
Grins said:
My teenage son actually prefers the store brand Aldi's frozen pizza (and other cheap store brands from Acme) - even over actual hot take-out pizza. I'm not complaining since it's a heckuva lot cheaper, but - no go for me.
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Never actually had their pizza, which is funny since we shop there all the time, and we are probably the reason the store is always out of queso, chips, and Girl Scout lookalike cookies ($2 a package too.... uhm yes!!!!) Next shopping trip that pizza is getting added!
 
I almost always buy the store brand stuff if it's available. I have never found much difference between store vs national brands.
 
Tywithay said:
Ketchup and Mustard
Sour cream
Mayonnaise

I'm sure there's more, but those immediately came to mind
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Although I buy brand name Mustard as well. I have never had Mustard I did not like.
 
Nerdy_81 said:
I'm all for saving a little money at the grocery store and grabbing a store brand or generic brand most of the time. In most cases they do a great job versus the national brand, but what are those one or 2 items that you just have to go national brand on no matter what?
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Considering that a great many store brands are the same thing as national brands, just in different packaging, the smart money is on buying store brand when you can.
 
Nerdy_81 said:
I'm all for saving a little money at the grocery store and grabbing a store brand or generic brand most of the time. In most cases they do a great job versus the national brand, but what are those one or 2 items that you just have to go national brand on no matter what?
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hot dogs. theres not a single good store brand hot dog.
 
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