The excellent reputation of the Lidl chain of stores gets an unfortunate blow from time to time. For example, in the Czech Republic he regularly had problems with non-compliance with the declared quality of his products, and this time he also got into trouble in his home country of Germany. Here, its former and current employees talked about how this chain uses tricks to confuse and deceive customers. And it’s a very nourishing read.
Shopping carts and price tags
Maybe you’ve ever wondered why Lidl’s shopping trolleys are so big. It’s no coincidence. This is where the customer deception begins. As one employee puts it, this is to make your purchases look smaller than they actually are. This then subliminally motivates the customer to buy more. Furthermore, the trolleys are designed so that the goods slide towards the handle. So the person doesn’t see part of the purchase and buys again.
“If we had smaller shopping trolleys today, Lidl would never have been able to generate the turnover it has,” says one of the employees. In Germany, for example, Lidl has also abolished shopping baskets. This is again due to the fact that people need to reach for their cart, which seems to be of great help in motivating them to shop. You may notice that even in the Czech Republic Lidl baskets are often hard to get, because there are so few of them.
Although shopping trolleys are certainly important, they alone would not be enough for the great success that Lidl has been celebrating throughout Europe in recent years. There are other tricks too. For example, the one with price tags. While in the vast majority of stores we find price tags below specific products, in Lidl’s case they are above it. As a result, customers are attracted to a low price that actually belongs to another product. This is how private and common brands are often confused.
Private labels as copies
Interesting things were also said about Lidl’s handling of supposedly fresh fruit and vegetables. For example, bananas are said to be harvested unripe and then imported here, where they are then ripened with the aid of special gases. Thanks to this, Lidl can decide for itself when the bananas are ripe for sale.
Lidl also relies heavily on its organic products. In Germany, it has therefore entered into a partnership with the agricultural association Bioland, which has very strict conditions. And indeed it offers some of its products, but at rather high prices. Around them, on the other hand, it displays products from its own organic range, which, according to the employees interviewed, only meet the most basic criteria to be labeled in this way. At the same time, customers should have the impression that they are buying something of high quality.
Lidl’s private label products are very popular. But these are specially created so that they are literally copies of the originals, both visually and in terms of taste. According to a former Lidl marketing officer, this is not fair, because the company is enriching itself at the expense of real brands. The paradox is that these products are often produced by the same manufacturer, which of course is literally forced to do so by Lidl. Otherwise, you risk having your original product removed from the assortment.
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