Immokalee residents are celebrating the opening of a new Aldi, ending nearly a year without a major grocery store in the rural community.
They began lining up long before sun-up Thursday and the official unveiling of the new and only full-fledged-grocer in town.
Some waited as much as five and a half hours in line for a chance to get a free bag of Aldi’s goodies reserved for the first 200 customers of the day.
By 8:30 a.m. when the doors officially opened there were some 600 people waiting. One of them was Ann Freeze.
“I’m hoping for free stuff. I’m excited for the Aldi opening to have a new grocery store,” Freeze said.
The excitement certainly was palpable, and not just for free stuff. Aldi tends to have a cult-like following for low priced, off-brand groceries. But many are also drawn to the store for its low-priced knock-offs of houseware goods that rotate out a weekly basis in the aisles known to many in the social media world as the "Aldi Aisle of Shame."
"I like the selection in Aldi's and I have always been a fan of the store so to have one so close is exciting," Freeze said.
But there’s another reason for all the fanfare. In the 11 months since the old Winn-Dixie closed, after being bought out by Aldi, Immokalee has been a food desert.
The closing left people with only far away options for major retailers, like the Publix Supermarket in Ave Maria which is about a 20 minute drive away.
So the arrival of the new store was a blessing to a man who only wanted to provide the name Abraham.
“It’s very good because we needed a grocery store around here because everybody got to drive way far to Publix and all that stuff to get groceries. Everybody been waiting for this right here,” he said.
Indeed, especially in rural Eastern Collier County where a majority of the Winn-Dixie shoppers walked or rode bikes to their old grocery store.
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