this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2024
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Some stores in the US do this, most notably Aldi. It's kind of a pain in the ass, especially in an increasingly cashless society.
Names a European store.
They sell like coin shaped discs you can put on your keyring, dunno if that's a thing in the US though.
Yes, I know Aldi started in Europe.
My point was, they have stores in the US, and their stores in the US also do this. Which is unusual for US stores. Trader Joe's, for example (which is also owned by one of the Aldi companies) just has regular carts without the coin chain things.
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That's not correct, actually. There were two brothers who inherited Aldi, and they did have a falling out over cigarettes, but they actually split the company in two - Aldi Nord (North) and Aldi Sud (South). As the names imply, they operate the Aldi stores in North and South Germany respectively.
In other countries, either Aldi Nord or Aldi Sud operates the Aldi stores, but they do not directly compete with each other. The exception is the US, where Aldi Sud operates the Aldi stores and Aldi Nord operates Trader Joe's (which the original owner of Aldi bought from Joe Coulombe in 1979).
Huh, that sounds familiar too. Looks like I screwed this up last time I researched the history of Trader Joe’s for some post like this.
You can 3D print a tool that lets you unlock the cart, then pull the tool back out, so you don't need to leave anything (coin or otherwise) in the cart to use it.
A good option if it's available to you, as long as it's tough enough, would suck if it broke up in there.
I mean, yeah. Aldi is European but has locations in the US. They're the only store here that does this afaik. I've never seen the keyring thing but sincw no other stores need a coin I'd have to shop at Aldi a lot to justify ordering one online.
It was tongue in cheek. But it does make sense a European chain would bring that over to the US.
They give those out at the shop info where I live