Business Insider/Jessica Tyler
We shopped at a lot of grocery stores this year, but one was better than the rest.
- We visited a lot of grocery stores in 2018, and some were a lot better than others.
- The stores we shopped at included Target, Walmart, Trader Joe's, Whole Foods 365, ShopRite, and Stop & Shop.
- After visiting each store, we found that one had a lot more to offer, at lower prices, with a great shopping experience. Here's the verdict.
We visited a lot of grocery stores in 2018, and some were a lot better than others.
While two of the stores we visited - Target and Walmart - are not exclusively grocery stores, each has been working on improving its grocery offerings, especially when it comes to e-commerce.
Walmart offers free two-day shipping on orders over $35, free same-day store pickup on certain orders, and same-day delivery in New York City through Jet.com, which it acquired in 2016. Similarly, Target offers free two-day shipping on orders over $35 and in-store pickup, and it announced earlier this year that it plans to offer same-day delivery of groceries from half of its 1,800 stores using Shipt, a delivery startup it acquired last December.
The remaining stores we visited are more traditional grocery stores.
Trader Joe's is known for its inexpensive and healthy products, and customers are willing to wait in sometimes outrageous lines to get groceries from the store. Most of the products it carries are private-label products.
Whole Foods, which is typically more expensive than Trader Joe's, recently expanded its chain of 365 stores to compete more directly with lower-priced grocers. Whole Foods 365 is designed to be more accessible and less expensive than a traditional Whole Foods store, and it emphasizes the retailer's private-label brand, also called 365.
We also visited ShopRite and Stop & Shop this year, two regional chains that have a large presence on the East Coast.
Based on price and overall shopping experience, this was the best grocery store we visited in 2018:
