26 March 2026
CHOICE has released the latest results of its quarterly grocery basket survey, including a spotlight on a basket of popular school lunchbox items.
This quarter, CHOICE compared the price of 17 products across Coles, Woolworths, Aldi and IGA. This included our usual base basket of 7 items, plus 10 products you might buy to fill a lunchbox, such as yoghurt pouches, cheese slices, Vegemite, and multipack chips.
“Working out what to put in your child’s lunchbox every single day of the week is hard enough without also having to figure out which supermarket has the best deal on school snack essentials. This quarter, we’ve done the hard work for you, including items like baby cucumbers, packs of sultanas, and yoghurt pouches in our basket survey,” says CHOICE Editorial Director, Mark Serrels.
“Without including specials, the best deal was found at Aldi, with our full basket of 17 items coming in at $75.98. At Woolworths, the basket cost $90.08, followed very closely by Coles at $90.90, and IGA at $101.84,” says Serrels.
“When including specials, Aldi was still the most cost-effective option, with their full basket costing exactly the same at $75.98. Woolworths again came in second, with a basket costing $89.08. At Coles, the basket with specials cost $90.09, and at IGA the basket came in at $99.10,” says Serrels.
The basket of just 10 school lunch products (without specials) was still cheapest at Aldi $41.96. At Woolworths, we found you’d pay $54.71. Coles was marginally more expensive at $55.17, while shopping at IGA would set you back $59.19. Special prices would save you about 80c at Coles, $1 at Woolies and $2.47 at IGA.
“This survey marks the last of our second year of quarterly surveys and our seven-item 2025 base basket comparison, which included bananas, strawberries, apples, carrots, milk, chicken and Weetbix. From March to December we found the average cost of this basket rose by 7%, with strawberries experiencing the most price volatility across the year. Milk, chicken and carrots had the smallest increase in price and apples rose the most, increasing 47% between our first and fourth quarterly surveys,” says Serrels.
Editor’s notes:
Supermarkets and locations
We sent undercover shoppers into 104 supermarkets – 27 Woolworths, 27 Coles, 23 Aldi and 27 IGA stores – in 27 locations across Australia in December 2025.
Grocery basket items
Our base basket includes:
- Full cream milk
- Sanitarium Weetbix
- Royal Gala apples
- Carrots
- Cavendish bananas
- Strawberries
- Chicken breast fillets, bulk pack
School lunch essentials for this quarter:
- Baby cucumbers
- Blueberries
- Yoghurt pouches
- Cheese slices
- Ham
- Vegemite
- Sultana 6-pack
- Wholemeal sandwich bread
- Multipack chips
- Tinned tuna
At Aldi, our school basket included five name-brand and five home-brand items. At Coles, Woolworths and IGA, we compared the same 10 name-brand products at all three stores.
