Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Food at WalMart?

Personally I have a love/hate relationship with WalMart, aka Wally World, as it is known in my family. I disagree with many of their business practices on principle. But for some items, the price and availability is enticing.

Of course, I know typically I'm getting what I pay for. Several months ago, a friend told me that even standardized products that seem identical to those sold in other stores, may not be the same product. When I heard this, I immediately thought back to bagels...(cue traveling back in time music)....

At the grocery store, I try to buy as much of my food on special or discount as possible. One week, fancy bagels were BOGO. They were delish, had no HFCS, were only 300 calories each, and had fiber and protein. Unfortunately, when I went back to get more, the price had gone back up and I just couldn't justify paying the extra cost. (While I have no problem spending extra money on some food items like organics and fresh seafood, I am disciminatory in the practice.) While at Wal-Mart for some staples (cleaning products or something), I decided to see if they carried the bagels. (I haven't shopped at Wal-Mart for food since college because I found the quality lacking, but more on that later.) They did! I bought a few bags since they were considerably cheaper than at the grocery. But I never bought more because almost every bagel in each bag had a weird burnt taste. It didn't mean anything to me at the time. But after my friend's comment it occurred to me that maybe I was paying less because these bagels were mistakes.

I have tried buying Wal-mart produce in the past, but was always disappointed at the flavor and how quickly it went bad. Even at the nicest of Wally Worlds, much of the produce always seemed icky. At one local store I've even seen gnats and flies swarming around the fruit...and it was one of the nicer/newer stores!

I've also had issue with WM weaseling their way into the local and organic food markets. But it's a sticky subject for reasons that I will not delve into right now.

So when a friend recently told me about an article that claims WM food was just as good as that from Whole Foods, I was intrigued.

Here is the article.

What do you think???

1 comment:

  1. Interesting article on Wally World. I haven't been to one in some time. I can get great discounted cleaning supplies and paper products at Aldi as well as other good finds. As for good food, I also take into consideration the atmosphere. Without having a Trader Joe's near, I go to the newest Earthfare in my area. Best of all when the season is right, my local farmers market for truly fresh, local produce.

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