Supermarkets

Following a long and involved discussion overheard between two colleagues recently, I have been musing on supermarkets in the USA. When we first came here, we were overwhelmed with the options.
Supermarkets near us (off the top of my head)

• Safeway
• Sam's Club (membership only warehouse)
• Target (same store as in Australia, only less clothing, and an entire supermarket down the back. Sort of like finding the Secret Garden really)
• Grauls
• Wegmans (I think that is how you spell it)
• Whole Foods
• The Fresh Market
• Trader Joes
• Giant
• Dutch Markets (run by Amish people, sort of like a huge continental supermarket, with seriously nice pastries)
• Shoppers

I had thought I would look up the internet and list all the others I found, but I just found a list that is so big, I can't be bothered. The point is, there are atleast 6 different 'large' grocery chains that own many other grocery stores under different names, grocery stores like Trader Joes that have about 400 stores across America, and then there are the local (er) grocery stores like Grauls, that owns about three around the place, or Wegmans, that is concentrated in Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania and a couple of other nearby states.
Supermarkets in Australia:

• Coles
• Woolworths
• Aldi
• IGA
• Franklins (recently bought up by IGA?)

We arrived with our Australian mentality of all the supermarkets being pretty much the same, you just find the nearest "Colworths" and shop there. I had one friend explain to me that she knows certain items are always cheaper at Target, so when she is low on those items, she goes there and just buys those things. I thought it sounded a bit crazy at the time, but now we are going to Trader Joes for the nice icecream, Whole Foods for frozen yoghurt sticks in summer, and Grauls for pizza bases!

There is one last point to consider:
Population in Australia - 23 million (2013)
Population in America  - 316 million (2013)
Which makes the increase in amount of supermarkets sort of understandable.