San Pellagrino

[yeggy]

Does anyone know if San Pellagrino softdrinks are still sold in Montreal and if so where? Thanks for any info.

[Haggisboy]

Considering that they sell the full range of San Pellegrino drinks in my company's cafeteria, I'd say they can be found anywhere.

[Fritzy]

The Provigo on corner of du Fort and Ste-Cath has individual cans for sale.

[Arktik]

I buy mine at Aubut -the cans of Aranciata, hate the glass bottles.

[xIcewind]

Does anyone know where I can buy a flat of these drinks? Buying them by the can gets a bit pricy. Costco used to sell 24s of them, but they're not there anymore.

[carswell]

Aubut's online catalogue lists SanPellegrino [sic] Aranciata, Chinotto and Limonata in 24 x 200-ml bottles and 24 x 330-ml cans. www.aubut.ca

[xIcewind]

I gave them a call, but I am still quite confused. My limited french did not help the situation.

Are they a store (albeit bulk) like Costco, where I can go in and browse a catalogue and they'll give me the items, or are they a service where you order ahead and then pick up/have them deliver the order to you?

The lady on the phone mentioned a mish-mash of the two, which confuses me. I don't have the facilities to go down to there more than once, so this may get tricky.

Thanks!

[kpzoo]

"Are they a store (albeit bulk) like Costco, where I can go in and browse a catalogue and they'll give me the items, or are they a service where you order ahead and then pick up/have them deliver the order to you?"

Neither. It's just like a regular supermarket, but with mostly larger sizes of everything. You go through with your shopping cart like at a regular market and pick out what you want. Very simple!

[carswell]

Have never been to Costco but it sounds like that's the model. It's a warehouse style space with ceiling-high industrial shelving full of products packaged mostly in commercial or wholesale quantities (50-lb bags of flour, 1 gal. tubs of duck fat, shrink-wrapped flats of 24 soft drink cans, etc.). It's also self-serve: you get a cart, push it around the store, load on it what you want and pay for it at the checkout counter. I don't recall seeing the San Pellegrino drinks so don't know whether they come in mixed case form but the catalogue implies you can get a flat of 24 cans of the same variety.

If you go, take note of the store hours: they aren't open evenings.

[EaterBob]

Aubut opened twelve years before Costco opened their first store anywhere, and five years before Price Club started doing business, and 20 years before they came to Montreal, so if anything Costco/Price Club is modeling their business on Aubut, not the other way around.

And beyond the industrial sizes, Aubut also sells in quantities that are suitable for more reasonable consumption and do not require a home warehouse, along with fresh produce, dairy and other products that make it the equivalent of a very large and very cheap grocery store.

I'm personally quite fond of the fact that they only have the one store, that they are hyper-local to Montreal and have those funky long and extremely narrow carts that are more suitable to when they were up at Marche Centrale and people were not as large as they are now and the aisles were so narrow as to be insane.

[xIcewind]

Thanks for the help, everyone!

Aubut had 24x 200mL and 24x330mL for aranciata, limonata, and chinotto. The former was 13.20 per and the latter was 15.49.

Thanks again!

[carswell]

«if anything Costco/Price Club is modeling their business on Aubut, not the other way around. And beyond the industrial sizes, Aubut also sells in quantities that are suitable for more reasonable consumption»

xIcewind was asking about two business models. My point was that Costco and Aubut both use the self-serve warehouse store model, as opposed to the catalogue merchant model, not that Aubut was modelled on Costco or FedMart. And while it's true that Aubut sells regular-sized items, I never claimed they didn't ("packaged MOSTLY in commercial or wholesale quantities"). But, yes, it's a great resource with interesting products, friendly staff and good prices. Far preferable to a warehouse chain.

[hala]

also, big difference between Aubut and Cosco is that they have an annual fee at Cosco, but not at Aubut.

[alixium]

I've seen that Milano has flats of them for sale.

[Shattered]

Ummm... anywhere?!

[alixium]

San Pellegrino is sold nearly everywhere... I've seen many kinds at Milano on St-Laurent, but many many other grocery stores carry them.

[yeggy]

Thanks, I am never on St-Laurent but what you are saying is that it is available in supermarket chains right?

[cherylmtl]

I know Loblaws carries them for sure.

[yeggy]

Thanks so much.