Grocery Hunt: ‘I put that price comparison column on everything’

Hello! Welcome to Week 24 of the Grocery Hunt, Manchester Ink Link’s guide to Manchester-area grocery stores.

Each week, we ask our readers to give us five specific grocery items and five separate Manchester-area grocery stores so we could find the prices and availability of those items. Last week we looked at spices, and this week we’re looking at food that’s spicy!

We’re also tracking the prices and availability of each item week by week with the hopes of finding the local grocery store with the best prices and best availability for items that our readers are looking for.

Before we begin, here are some caveats.

  • All prices were checked on Wednesday, June 16 from approximately 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Prices and item availability may change without notice.
  • Items may have been available during the aforementioned time but could not be found. Within this column, all efforts available to an ordinary grocery shopper were made to find the item. If you see an error here, please e-mail a picture of the item and the price tag to andy@manchesterinklink.com
  • Unless asked for a specifically sized item by a reader, situations where stores have different sizes of the exact same item will be compared by weight or volume. If stores have multiple variations of an item with differing prices, the lowest price will be used.
Ghost peppers. Photo/Wikimedia Commons

Ghost Peppers

Unfortunately, Ghost Peppers were not available for sale at any of the stores we visited this week. However, they are available by mail through specialty websites such as alamopeppers.com

Peppered Pork Loin (cost per oz.)

Walmart: 275 Gold St., Manchester, NH – $.27 per oz.

Market Basket: 460 Elm St., Manchester, NH – $.33 per oz.

Shaw’s: 570 Daniel Webster Hwy, Merrimack, NH – n/a

Target: 220 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – n/a

Hannaford: 859 Hanover St., Manchester, NH – n/a

Takis (9.9 oz. bag)

Target: 220 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – $2.59

Walmart: 275 Gold St., Manchester, NH – $2.98

Shaw’s: 570 Daniel Webster Hwy, Merrimack, NH – $2.99

Market Basket: 460 Elm St., Manchester, NH – $3.00

Hannaford: 859 Hanover St., Manchester, NH – $3.29

Frank’s Red Hot (16 oz.)

Walmart: 275 Gold St., Manchester, NH – $2.50

Target: 220 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – $2.59

Market Basket: 460 Elm St., Manchester, NH – $2.83

Hannaford: 859 Hanover St., Manchester, NH – $2.99

Shaw’s: 570 Daniel Webster Hwy, Merrimack, NH – $3.45

Gochujang (cost per oz.)

Target: 220 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – $0.25 per oz.

Market Basket: 460 Elm St., Manchester, NH – $0.37 per oz.

Hannaford: 859 Hanover St., Manchester, NH – $0.42 per oz.

Shaw’s: 570 Daniel Webster Hwy, Merrimack, NH – $0.50 per oz.

Walmart: 275 Gold St., Manchester, NH – n/a

 

Number of times when a store had the best price on a particular item (Year-to-Date) (After Week 24)

Market Basket: 460 Elm St., Manchester, NH – 33

Walmart: 275 Gold St., Manchester, NH – 32.33

Hannaford: 859 Hanover St., Manchester, NH – 17.33

Target: 220 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – 8

Aldi: 1111 S. Willow St., Manchester, NH – 7.5

Shaw’s: 570 Daniel Webster Hwy, Merrimack, NH – 3

Price Rite: 365 Lincoln St., Manchester, NH – 1.5

Hannaford: 7 Kilton Rd, Bedford, NH 03110 – 1.83

Shaw’s: 1328 Hooksett Rd., Hooksett, NH – 1

Ocean State Job Lot: 1328 Hooksett Rd., Hooksett, NH – 1

Hannaford: 140 Bicentennial Dr, Manchester, NH – .5

Bunny’s Superette: 75 Webster St., Manchester, NH – 0

Saigon Asian Market: 476 Union St., Manchester, NH – 0

Whole Foods: 121 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – 0

A Market: 125 Loring St., Manchester, NH – 0

Number of times when a store had a particular item in stock (After Week 24)

Market Basket: 460 Elm St., Manchester, NH – 94

Hannaford: 859 Hanover St., Manchester, NH – 88

Walmart: 275 Gold St., Manchester, NH – 84

Shaw’s: 570 Daniel Webster Hwy, Merrimack, NH – 55

Target: 220 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – 36

Aldi: 1111 S. Willow St., Manchester, NH – 13

Shaw’s: 1328 Hooksett Rd., Hooksett, NH – 12

Price Rite: 365 Lincoln St., Manchester, NH – 8

Hannaford: 140 Bicentennial Dr, Manchester, NH – 7

Hannaford: 7 Kilton Rd, Bedford, NH 03110 – 3

Ocean State Job Lot: 1328 Hooksett Rd., Hooksett, NH – 2

Whole Foods: 121 S River Rd, Bedford, NH – 2

Bunny’s Superette: 75 Webster St., Manchester, NH – 1

Saigon Asian Market: 476 Union St., Manchester, NH – 0

A Market: 125 Loring St., Manchester, NH – 0

Previous Grocery Hunts