Aldi

The German discounter that proves when environmental pressures are strong enough, everyone evolves the same solution.

Founded in 1946 by Karl and Theo Albrecht in post-war Essen, Aldi pioneered extreme retail minimalism: ~1,400 SKUs (versus 40,000+ at traditional supermarkets), 90% private label products, no-frills store design, 10,000-20,000 sq ft neighborhood stores. This model emerged from post-war scarcity. What's fascinating: Trader Joe's, founded in 1960s California abundance, independently converged on nearly identical operational metrics. Same SKU count, similar private label percentage, comparable store footprint, similar inventory turns.

The convergent evolution demonstrates single-peak fitness landscapes. When environmental pressures (high real estate costs, labor costs, inventory carrying costs, brand negotiation overhead) are overwhelming, all competitors optimizing for efficiency climb toward the same solution. The path doesn't matter - post-war scarcity or California differentiation - the destination is identical because physics and economics create one dominant peak.

Aldi's German dominance (4,000+ stores globally) also defeated Walmart's attempted import of the U.S. model to Germany. Aldi had scale (4,000+ vs Walmart's 95 stores), cultural fit (Germans prefer efficiency over friendliness), and format advantages (neighborhood stores vs big-box). Aldi sold milk at €0.60/liter versus Walmart's €0.75, demonstrating that local adaptation beats imported playbooks.

The lesson: convergent evolution means your differentiation is temporary when strong selection pressures exist. And geographic expansion requires local adaptation - what works in one ecosystem can fail catastrophically when transplanted without modification.