The US State With The Most Aldi Locations (It's Not California)

Discount grocery chain Aldi has been expanding rapidly in the United States — the demand for affordable grocery stores seems to be driven by the rising cost of living. It's a reliable place to purchase household basics and pantry staples, which means many Americans depend on it for day-to-day groceries. As of the time of this writing, there are over 2,600 Aldi locations across the country, and though you might think there'd be more storefronts in larger states, that's not necessarily true. For example, California has 108 Aldi stores, but that's less than half of the state with the most locations, which happens to be Florida.

Florida comes in with an impressive 272 locations. Aldi has big changes planned, including expanding even more aggressively in Florida. In the past few years it acquired almost 80 Harvey's Supermarket and Winn-Dixie stores — Aldi is set to replace Florida locations of these southern supermarket chains. It's also going to create a new distribution center in the state and expand the chilled storage capabilities of an existing one — this expansion is key in meeting demands across the Southeast. Illinois comes in at second place with 218 Aldi locations, which might seem random, but there's a good reason why Illinois is also a big center for Aldi.

Illinois might seem like a random place to host a lot of Aldi locations, but it's not. That's because Aldi's United States headquarters are located in Batavia, Illinois. It's only natural that there would be so many stores near its home base, even though the company was originally founded in Germany. (Fun fact: The first Aldi store opened up in Iowa in 1976.) Batavia is just over 40 miles west of Chicago. 

I live in Chicago; I'm within a 10-minute drive of four locations, so I can attest to the store's popularity even in the most densely populated area of Illinois. When I was growing up, Aldi wasn't particularly popular, but now it's a place that has a cult following, not only for its food but also for the trendy, reasonably priced, limited-time offerings in Aldi's "Aisle of Shame." The state that comes in third in terms of Aldi locations is Pennsylvania, with 171 stores, so if you're an Aldi superfan, just know that Florida, Illinois, and Pennsylvania may be just the states for you.