I think this is a really good video! You're very well informed and explain how many of the differences are based on culture (like the no small talk thing) with a very "that's just how they do things!" kind of attitude rather than being annoyed like I've seen a lot of people get in these kinds of videos and I really appreciate that!
Being Norwegian i learned a lot about how grocery stores are in the US through this video and i found it interesting. I like the idea of more comparison videos.
As an American living in Norway, you are right on. Only thing I would add, that I have not seen in the US are the pante machines for recycling bottles and cans. I miss American stores and variety. Not to mention opening hours.
Wow, you don't have pantemachines? The more I know about America vs. Norway, the more I feel like I don't know a thing about America xD But what do you do with all the bottles? Just throw them away with all the other plastic?
I'm not entirely sure about all the states, but the west coast states definitely have pant/recycling machines. there is even redemption values embossed on the bottles and cans.
+Nullik Well, due to the fact that so many people have reason to come here, which is utterly destroying the country, I wish Norway never did find oil. Norwegians would have been much better off by themselves.
+Nullik How hard to build roads in Tiny ( 42 925 km² Pop. 5 707 251), Pancake - flat Denmark, w.o. any real winter, V.S Norway ( Finnmark county 48 618 km² -Norway 385 178 km² Pop. 5 213 985 Modern worlds most(?) demanding land to build roads in ). Cost of Denmarks alcohol policy ..? Deep analysis much..? ExEMTNor
Fun to see your face in one of the bigest news papers in norway, with link to this videu. Suspecting you will get a bit more views this week. Well deserved!
The reason for the low variety in foods is 1. We don't want huge amounts of food waist. 2. Buy lokal food is preoritays. Eco friendly. Food getting flown in is not eco. 3. We DO have internet shopping. 4. The sit down policy is not rude, it's about how can we make make your working conditions/ergonomics as good as possible.
I'm Finnish and I just spent two weeks in Florida and this video mentions pretty much all the differences I noticed when comparing Finnish and American grocery stores. It seems like we are very similar to the Norwegians in this sense. One thing I noticed is that all the fruits and veggies were way more expensive in the US, for example the cheapest apples I could find were 1.4$/lb whereas you can often get apples for 1€/kg which is like 0.45$/lb in Finland. On the other hand stuff like sodas, cookies and other sugary stuff were way cheaper in the US. Maybe this has something to do with the prevalence of obesity there, heh. It's also weird that tax isn't included in the printed price in the USA, I think it's just easier to include the tax so you don't have to do mental math just to know the price you're really paying.
Yeah I was so happy to see that healthier food was more affordable than junkfood when I moved. Cheap junkfood is quite a problem in the US, in my opinion. I am also glad that the tax is included in the printed price here.
+tuzmo There's probably somerules of thumb you can use like "Add about this many cents per dollar and you get a good approximation" or something. People get used to many things.
Standing for 7 1/2 hours is very straining, hence they sit. Also, the machines with the painkillers also hold cigarettes to prevent exposure of bad stuff. PS: Stores get fresh bread every day.
Very interesting to watch.. :) We love seeing foreigners point of view on our society. Some shops will let you buy medicine while checking out, you just say what you need and they give it to you. And I wish you talked more about chocolate! Our chocolate is so good... but then again I'm biased. And I want to commend you for learning so much Norwegian.. that's really cool. I know most people in Norway will probably switch to English when they realize you're an American, which will make it more difficult for you to pick up on Norwegian. So kudos to you! :) Oh, and I want to add something. If you miss US groceries, try and find a Meny shop. They're more rare, but they're part of a big chain of grocery shops as well. And their selection is much bigger. You can find American pancake mix, Ben & Jerries ice cream, different peanut butters, Hersheys chocolate and lots of other US items. :)
+Republic3D Our Freia, Oslo based factory, chocolate used to be good until it was sold to an American company and they "internationalized" the recepies. Remember how the Helnøtt tasted before, when it was made with dark chocolate?
This was really fun to watch as a Norwegian, thank you! I've worked a couple of years in another food store chain in Norway, so let me know if you have any questions. I think the Norwegian loff and British loaf are related. The word "loff" simply came to denote "British bread", since they eat a lot of white bread. If you want white bread, ask for "loff". (We eat it with shrimps, for instance.) We had an American redditor visit us in Oslo once, and he was so thrilled about kaviar, so it's cool that you mentioned it:) Also, the reason why we have so little variety of fresh produce is that it's historically pretty new to Norway (again IMO). My father (~60 years) was 12 years old the first time he saw an orange, but he grew up way up north. Here in Oslo (and other bigger cities), you will have greater variety, more vegetarians, and also immigrant shops that sells fresh produce for a fraction of the price (Norwegian greens are expensive even though it's subsidized by the govt.) The typical Norwegian greens like carrots, potatoes, onion, cabbage, are mostly stuff that thrives underground. But we take pride in our strawberries.
Don't forget to mention to people to hit the bell button so we know when your video comes out otherwise we don't know. Thanks for the info on the differences of stores. I remember small talk isn't very common there but I would not like that at all!
I'm an American who moved to Norway 22 years ago. Obviously I shared a lot of the same surprises as you when I first got here, but after a while it all seem very "daglidags". I notice the differences more when I go back to the States for a visit! Having grown up in Upstate NY, I've had worse winters there than here in Kristiansand! I've watched a few of your videos and have enjoyed (and shared) your point of view.....looking forward to seeing the rest of your uploads :)
+Tim Howe I suppose it is a lot colder in northern Norway, but I was seriously expecting those East coast winter temperatures here. Although I'm not mad about it not getting that cold. :-)
Norway has better quality food items. . we do have brands that are familiar to us and we also have the cheaper alternatives like store brands and low price brands.. In the US the high quality brands were similar to our cheaper store brands, it just seems mass produced, very sugary with lots of preservatives.
Bear Kuma That is just propaganda to defend the prices and lack of variety. If you ever had for example a beef anywhere else in the world, you would not say that our soggy "beef" is better quality. Monopoly like we have does not lead to better quality since people just have no choice but to buy whatever quality they put out.
bloxyman22 Norway has some of the strictest laws on how fresh and how much meat % a meat product should have, so yeah it's some of the worlds best, but the market is very lacking still.
+bloxyman22 I've had beef in quite a few places. Norwegian meat overall holds a very good quality. It's just that people aren't willing to pay the money for the good stuff. I think you're oversimplifying things a lot. It's not that we have monopolies (Although Lerøy should burn for their bullshit) so much that customers are often retards. Sell them a fish fillet and they'll always want the tail end, even though the neck-end is better. (Because paying for the bone is bad. But that tail-bit that is all-skin is fine.) It's amazing how much of the stupid shit people ask for that's just dump. If you ask for Entrecôte and they start sizing up slices thinner than a thumb, you have to stop them immediately and insist on thicker slices. It's just... Sad. So much really good stuff goes to waste because people want cheap ground beef and not better quality food. Nortura and TIne respond to what the market want, ultimately.
And: Coop - Big stores- Allot of items, low/good prices. Most stores have separate counters with fresh meat/fish and warm food. Kiwi - No fresh meat area. Small stores, low prices. Try to make good on vegetables Rema 1000 - Same things as Kiwi but allot better in my opinion. Lowest prices and good selection. Meny - Higher prices, but they have more special items, and they will order things for you if you need it. Altways fresh counters for fish, meats and warm foods. The chefs there will help you pick out anything you need.
Just found your channel. I met my (now) wife in California 2 years ago and she moved to Norway with me. Going to show your videos to her. I am sure she'll really like them! :)
Just found your channel and subscribed. You are doing a good job of filling in cultural and practical aspects of life in Norway that I have not found elsewhere. Please continue. Tusen takk! Ha det bra!
The clerks at Central Market stores in Texas will provide you with fruit samples if you ask. They all carry paring knives and are quick to cut off pieces of fruit and share. Like your Norwegian markets, Central Market also puts up tables with samples of fruits they are pushing that day.
The bread you slice yourself is fresh for the day, or made during night and late evening before store opening. The presliced bread has often been frozen and have a slightly longer shelf life.
The bagging is not because of lazyness, i just think it will go a lot faster for people to check out if they pack the bag themselves. BUT, recently they actually packed the bag for me, twice in a row. That is so uncommon for me and i was surprised, the first time it probably was because there was not enough space for me to do it myself, the second time there were no customers, and they actually decided to do it for me :D so surprised!
Wow was that in Norway where they packed your groceries? That would be a surprise. I worked in a store in the US and we had special bag holders that made with very easy to bag things quickly and we even had certain techniques to bag quickly.
AMERiNORGE yeah, first time in my life someone actually packed my bag for me. most stores now also require you the customer to get the bag yourself, you don't ask for it, customers do more themselves now than what they did before, i don't know why.
***** It actually has some to do with the store's politcy. In the store I used to work in Norway, I had to ask if the costumer if they wanted help with packing their groceries. The policy has to do with Norwegians being, either stubborn or really wanting to know in which bag every grocery is.etc
If you want a bigger selection of foreign food(foreign for Norway at least), you should go to the store named ''Meny''. Things are a little pricey, but as I said, they have a bigger selection of foreign food :)
Nice video man! Miss the norwegian food....good quality and half the amount of salt and sugar.....and the fish is a lot better in Norway...but I like it over here anyway :)
Fred if you are in the US the center of the US is far from the ocean and you won't see fish as much. East and West coast and maybe Minnesota, so many lakes so fresh water fish, you see better selections there.
We have a lot of the small chain-stores like Kiwi, Coop, Rimi, Rema, Bunnpris. They are small but usually have everything needed on a daily basis and there is always 1-3 within walking distance. We do also have some really huge stores, similar to the american ones, like OBS that basically fills half a mall, with one floor for groceries, one for sports equipment, one for building equipment and maybe a café. There are usually a few of these in each of the cities, but they're usually in a mall and not as close to most homes.
Bread is baked fresh, either early in the morning, or the day before. Old bread is thrown out by the end of the day. If you can't start working at 0600 you cannot be a baker. ;) EDIT: The reason there is not a lot of produce is partly because of the small-town thing (I live in Bergen, my local Coop Extra has 8-12 different types of potato. And... one type of Banana.), and partly because the local cuisine doesn't have all that many different vegetables in it. There's a slow revival going on though. As for the candy section, candy lasts for ~6 months at least. So having more shelf space for it isn't hard. But if you have 50 different types of fresh ham, then a lot of those will go bad, costing you money. So that's a thing.
+chris86simon The stores don't generally open until ~0900, and alcohol isn't sold until then either. You can easily have the bread ready at that 0800, and shipped out by 0830, and in the stores on time.
+HrHaakon its all about the delivery time to the different stores you will deliver to, I start baking at 2300 and at 0600 the bread are on the way to the stores
+AMERiNORGE When in Oslo, check out the produce shop in Mathallen. In the aisles in the back of the shop, they have all sorts of American brands of peanut butter, refried beans, mustards, US sodas etc I haven't seen anywhere else - they even have cans of Manwich :)
5:40 In Canada we have a lot of those bread slicers in most of the grocery stores here. Other smaller grocery stores tend to just have pre-sliced bread. And in grocery stores you do your own bagging. In supermarkets and big box stores like Wal Mart, the cashier does that. So it depends where you go.
At HEB in South Texas they leave out food often by itself (especially bread and fruit) to sample without anyone there...Breads will be in bags by the bread and fruit sometimes in produce. We also have the open whole bread that you can request to have sliced.
Also, how you have to leave the shopping basket and the little cart at the checkout; cigarettes and snooze are picked up at the machines which are usually located past the checkout register area:)
As a Norwegian I really enjoy these videoes :P Also worth noting that not all stores have these wending machines for medicine. Most places it's common having to ask the clerk for whatever product and then he'll scan it provided you're above 18 of course.
The bread is usually baked in the morning and then sent out to the stores before opening hours. Fresh is key in most Norwegian food, people joke about eating the tail-end of the fish first because that came out of the ocean the shortest time ago.
Janet Browning Don*t take the cussing to hard. It's really common in Norway to use cuss words, and it's not considered offensive in the same way it would in the US. Although I do agree it's uncalled for.
I think the largest difference between Norway and the US is that there aren't TV ads for drugs in Norway. To my understanding only the US and New Zealand have that type of advertising.
I'm vegan, and I live in Bergen. Here it's pretty easy. I tried going fruitarian (raw till four) for a while, but it became to expencive even though I went to the immigrants store (I'm a student). However, if you live of simple and whole foods like potatoes, rice, beans, vegetables, fruits, etc., it's possible anywhere. Most small stores even have plant based milks. Where there is will, there is a way! :) About the refried beans, as you stated, the Norwegian taco night is texmex. It's americanized, only picking the most unhealthy and appealing foods.That sort of means they put as little vegetables in as possible, and fill it with meats, sour cream and cheese. That's why the refried beans boxes are so small. Interesting video!
Having as little vegetables as possible is definitely not my experience with texmex/Mexican food in in the US. There has always been a nice amount of grilled and fresh vegetables when I've had it
idapeppp You being a vegan probably affects your view of taco negatively. It's not about picking the most unhealthy food, that's just a stupid thing to say. And of course meat is unappealing to you, you're a vegan. That's not the case for others. There is also lots of vegetables, I've never seen anyone eat tacos without them.
gonna check out all your videos. My daughter may be moving to Bergen soon and I'm nervous for her. We are from Indiana USA. Thanks for this video. I will be watching the rest of them tonight.
Nothing to worry about Mark Bergen is a nice city but it rain wery much there but it is safe as Fort Nox so dont worry .) And peoples are nice and helpful when you get to know them.
Your list is very similar to the one my wife (who is Canadian) has compiled in her time here. Luckily, over time, we have managed to source mac'n'cheese, proper (hellman's) mayo, chunkless jam and smooth peanut butter to satisfy her American cravings. (All at our local Coop Extra) :P "Real" American items seems to be a growing category in Norwegian grocery stores, with the selection and prevalence here having grown markedly over the last five years. One interesting thing: The vending machine for pharmacy goods (and tobacco items and razor blades) seems to be going away. It used to be everywhere, but now I can't remember seeing one in ages. The practice practically everywhere I shop is that those items are now in a closed off box behind the counter (some stores have small displays with their selection of medical items, but never tobacco) and you ask for what you want. The clerk then unlocks the cabinet and adds the chosen item to your pile'o'goods on the belt.
Great video! I'm from Norway (and live here), so it was interesting to hear your opinion on culture difference/your experience being here. I definitely agree with you about the lack of variety (it's something we've been complaining about the last few years). Just to point out that the machine with painkillers and stuff you mentioned is not in all stores, if i want painkillers/smoke etc i have to ask the clerk as it's all stored behind him/her (Kiwi). Looking forward to more videos, subscribed!
Our company tried electronic tags but they had many issues. 1) they didn't work well in the freezer cases 2) the tags were hard wired and you would lose prices on whole aisles. 3) the stocking crews would damage the hardwired cables when stocking the shelves. Until they come out with wireless tags they will not be more common in stores.
I used to work in a grocery store in Norway, and it costs 250 Norwegian kroner for 1 of those electronic "price tags". A normal medium sized store in Norway has about 2500 different groceries.250kr x about 2500 is a lot of money
Davian Sunly That is quite expensive! I think it's one of those long term savings situations. The alternative is the 100's of thousands of tags that have to be printed on a yearly basis. The paper and printer ink/toner quickly adds up too. That and the extra time it takes to swap out the tags, they have to pay wages for that extra time. So I think they end up saving money for the company. Plus it's better for the environment and that always looks good. ...still that is a large chunk of money wow. I wonder if they get a better bulk price and it only costs 250kr to replace individual displays.
AMERiNORGE Fun fact about the price tags (both paper and digital): it's by law that the prices have to have listed the price per quantities. Like, how much it costs per kilogram, per litre, per wash (For washing products). This is because it's easier to compare the prices to between brands/products that have different size of packaging.
Davian Sunly the labels in rema 1000 only cost about 25 nok, so they are not so expencive. the ones they have in kiwi/coop and meny cost about twice. (50 NOK)
What a fun video - well done! I have to say, I live in Oslo and I hate going to the local grocery store, because there's hardly anything in there I want to eat. They never have all the vegetables that I need, the produce stand is often a sorry sight. They don't carry organic meat or other quality foods. I don't have a car since I live in the inner city, so it's quite a hassle to find all the food I need. Luckily I like caviar too! Organic peanut butter is relatively new in grocery stores, so you were lucky with that one ;)
Great vid, funny to see what an American thinks. As of now, I subscribe to your channel. I have also been missing the bigger cans of beans in stores here. In Coop you get some beans in chili sauce that is kind of good, and that can be used with tacos. But I wish we could have some big cans of refried beans.
Kenneth Wiger Thank you for the sub. :-) I have tried the chili beans and actually one time I mashed them up with the sauce they come with to try and make some refried beans. It wasn't the same, but it was pretty good.
About the medicine, they dont give you a new receipt, they simple scan the code on the one you already have, and that code then gets active on the vending machine
About the bagging: My friends and I went on a (awsome) five week road trip through the US and we were surepriced that we did not have to bag our groceries. But we wish we could, because we always ended up with twice the amunt of bags that we needed (Toothpaste, orange, candy bar and a can of soda in one bag!? There is so much more room!) We actually used to bag the groceries more efficient when we got out of the stores.
Very interesting. The grocery store selling pain killers (Paracet, Ibux) and other non-prescription drugs is quite recent here in Norway. Some years ago you had to go to the apotek (pharmacy) to get that. Also getting drugs from a vending machine is unfamiliar to me. At Kiwi where I shop in Oslo, drugs are stored in a locked cabinet behind the cashier and you have to ask for it. Do you have a word for pålegg in English? Pålegg covers anything you would put on a slice of bread. Pålegg in a tube is very convenient for travelling or a days hike in the outdoors. A slang word for it is "tytepålegg" (tyte describes the action that takes place when you squeeze the tube).
I guess the coop you were at was Coop Prix. Coop Prix and Kiwi are small stores with not a great selection in wares. They are no supermarkets. You should check out Meny or Coop Obs if you want to see how a norwegian supermarket looks like. With a much larger selection in wares.
I find it funny that bagging the groceries actually bothers you, I'd rather do it myself so I can sort them. All things that go in the fridge in one and so on, that way I know where things are when I unpack ^^ Also I work with sampling as a part time job, it happens more in the cities and like in America we usually sample new foods.
I try sorting that way too. I've even started to put things on the belt in the order I plan on bagging. I think the part that is hard for me is that I'm not used to doing it this way so I start to feel rushed then get flustered and all my organization goes out the window. LOL. For someone that has grown up never doing that, it's quite a shock. I'm getting used to it though so it'll be no big deal eventually. As for samplers, I guess our location is just too small to have someone standing there. Every time there are samples out they are unguarded.
Yeah, and the fruit samples is common everywhere. The stores themselves sample fruits and "fresh food"(only in bigger stores where they sell fresh seafood, cooked chicken and so on) which usually does not come from a brand but a local producer or is made in the store. These samples are unguarded I guess it's because the rules for the stores are less strict, we have pretty strict rules when sampling and the rules vary depending on which company we sample for. Good luck with the bagging, just stick to the small local stores where not everyone is buying loads ;) (It's way worse in the big ones, everyone is shopping for the entire week)
haha I think that's my second reason for not liking the bagging. We shop for the week or more at a time so we have several bags to fill. oh well I'll get the hang of it.
AMERiNORGE as a norwegian i also can get nervous packing groceries ,haha.. usually i buy little at a time but often..i don't know how the "entire week shoppers" do it .
I think the differences you mentioned are pretty accurate for almost any European cities/towns, because in Hungary our grocery stores are almost the same.
Oh one more thing. Not all stores has those vending machines. The pain killers will still not be on shelves for you to pick it up and take it with you. They are either in a vending machine like you say, OR they are in a shelf next to the clerk and you have to ask THEM for whatever it is that you want/need.
This was a wierd experience to watch a comparrison and see what we do different (I'm from Norway so yeah.) One little thing that is common though is that if the clerk know you he / she will chat with you, of course it will be brief but still. And sometimes they offer to bag your groceries as they scan them in to, mostly not of course but sometimes when the line is short (I don't get it) they do that for me.... But I find a lot of things I didn't think about in this video and it was funny :) Nice video
The vending machine thing. Sometimes it's sold in the same way as the cigarettes and 'snus' (Which I just realized is ALSO placed in vending machines if they have them....) But normally you tell the clerk what you want, and they will take it down from a cabinet with tinted windows (Due to laws to prevent people from the temptation if they're trying to quit)
Whole Foods has samples of fruit sitting out just like what you showed from a Norwegian fruit sample plate. They have them all over the stores, in the cheese department, fruit department, etc. I've also seen it in Better Health.
I live in a smaller town in Norway, and when I make my tacos I usually buy either Kidney beans or Chili beans.. It's whole beans in a saucy substance. :)
I enjoy the chili beans. I will even smash them up sometimes and heat them in a frying pan to get them closer to being like the refried beans in the States. The flavor is a bit different because we use different type of beans to make refried beans but it still turns out pretty tasty.
All the problems with a little selection is because you seems to live in a very little town. Also some stores which have more employes, clerks often ask to help you bag your grocery. The thing with despensiers are so you don't have to show the entire store what you are getting
See the thing about our stores are that... If you ask for it, they will for the most part take it in. An example.. I used to drink a lot of ice tea, and most stores have these powder ice tea bags where you just add water. Now the store that's closest to where I live had peach and lemon. I REALLY REALLY wanted the mango one, so I asked them to start taking that in. And within a week they had it in stock. (This was a Joker store in Akershus) Now that isn't really a problem to take in either because.. well they won't expire for like years. So even if they were to have 50 left and I stopped buying them (which i have btw :p) it would still be okay because even though I was mainly the one that bought them other people would buy them from time to time as well. I did give them a notice that I did stop buying them, becuase like i said i was the main person buying them and i'd buy a ton of them (I'd probably drink 3 in one day //= 3 liters). Now with things that would expire quickly I think they would be more careful about taking it in, without being absolutely certain seeing how I actually haven't asked them to take in something that would expire relatively fast (within a month or shorter time). But the chance is that they would buy in a small amount of it to see if it actually would sell. You should def try this. Now in regards to getting things that are made in other countries that isn't stereotypical for Norway I don't think you would get, but maybe a good variety of that brand/item you wish they had? :) Anyways good luck with your groceries hunting! :D P.S I really enjoyed this video! you should make more comparison videos
Coop has a few different "version" of their stores Coop Mega is groceries and other stuff, Coop Bygg is house stuff, Coop Obs is only groceries.. I don't know how many there are. Also bread! I visited my girlfriend's grandparents in Finland in a tiny cottage in the middle of nowhere near a lake, and a small store within walking distance had a larger selection of EVERYTHING! Like a full 10 meter aisle filled with different sorts of bread! It's like we don't want to give ourselves any options in Norway xD I didn't know we had more than one type of peanut butter :'D
I live in Michigan in the us, and we have a department store chain called khol's that has used the electronic price sticker system for several years now. it's so far the only store I've seen use it, though. Interesting about bagging your own groceries with the divider, we also have some self checkout lanes that have those, I didn't know it was a scandanavien thing.
I had some similar shocks when moving from US to Australia. Peanut butter? Bologna? MUCH less selection in a lot of things. Then there's the weird stuff like Vegemite and cordial. Similar snack shelves - I guess the corporate multinationals have sold those very well worldwide! But in the 15 years I've been here - Australian shops now look more and more like US ones.
In 2012 I was in Chicago, Manhattan, San Francisco, Austin and New Orleans, to mention some of the places I visited. I never noticed that the employees in grocery stores and supermarkets were talking more to the customers there than they do in Norway. Maybe they did, but without me noticing it. The only exception was a cashier who started to talk with the man in front of me about his physical appearance and if he used rollerblades in his job and stuff like that (and no, they did not know each other). Really weird. As someone being born in the 70s, I'm old enough to remember when being a cashier was a job almost exclusively for women, and when I saw the first male cashier (those males who owned the grocery store was an exception) it looked a bit unusual for me. Kiosks and carts and that, that on the other hand employees of both genders.
I live in Norway and those beans you are talking about.... we don't use them that mutch in tacos as americans. Maybie thats why you can find only one type of them?
I've lived in Norway all of my life and let me tell you, if you want more variety in Foods, you pretty much HAVE to go to the stores Meny, Coop Mega or CC Mat. (These are only found in the bigger cities though). All Three of them have a pretty huge variety of stuff, including fruits, vegetables, fresh meat, fish and hygiene products. The smaller stores are good enough if you just need "something on the go", but other than that, I preffer to use "the big three" because of the greater variety. I live about 45 min (by car) from these stores and I live in a small town. As for peanut butter, I'm not sure about Jif, but I know Skippy is pretty easy to find here. Also, schools here DO have cafeterias. We usually have to buy the stuff we want though, it's not free. At least that's how it was at my schools. And finally something that I've just noticed: The clerks usually stand in the smaller stores, while they sit in the bigger ones. This makes sense though, as in the smaller stores in rural areas with less customers, they don't need to sit there all the time. The chair would only be in the way. In the bigger, more busy stores in the urban areas however, the clerks need to stay put behind the checkout for a longer period of time which is why sitting comes in handy. This only applies to grocery stores though, in all other stores the clerks will always stand behind the counter. When it comes to the clerk putting your stuff in the bags, I think it is much better how it is here. Are we really this busy/lazy that we can't do this ourselves? I'm sure the clerks have better things to do, like keeping the store tidy or taking care of the customers after you. What do you do after paying anyway? Just stand there and wait? No thanks. Btw, your groceries won't get mixed up, because they have a separation thingy. The clerk won't just send the next customers stuff down to your stuff.
The reason we dont have people to guard the samples, bag our bags and so on is because that would be to expensive for the stores! ;) Im sure you already know that the people working in stores in Norway have a pretty good hourly wage, I would say its around 15-16 usd in grocery stores.
+MegaHannah86 This has nothing to do with the wages itself, but rather the fact that the socioeconomic differences in Norway are relatively low. The hourly wage in Norwegian grocery stores can be $100 as an example, but with socioeconomic differences like the United States, workers packing the customer's bags would be a much more common site in Norway as well.
Do you even do your own chocolate in Norway? Just milk chocolate must be expensive AF! Some people here though want to close the border to Norway I can't really deny being one of them ;) *Grabs popcorn*
Actually, Norway's got fantastic chocolate. A company named Freia which creates magnificent chocolate. When they expanded into Sweden, they changed their name to Maribou because of copyright reasons, and I thiiiink it's a fairly well known chocolate brand?? Moreso than Freia, anyway, but Freia chocolate is absolutely fantastic :P And I'm not even a big fan of chocolate.
We've got a thing called Kvikk lunch, which is made by Freia. It is literally you're inferior kex with our master-race chocolate. your argument is invalid sir...
In Sweden they have a bigger selection, except in hard discount stores like Netto and LIdl (like the American Save a'lot). In Norway there are some well selected stores in Oslo, (Jacobs, Centra and so on has about 100 000 different items), but the average store has reduced its inventory from 25 000 different items to around 10 000, and Rema and KIWI are at around 3000.
Thank you Ronald. Always love your videos This one is great. Our grocery store chains (the big multiple location stores) sell the same type of crap in California. The best store chain is a German owned and managed small store called 'Trader Joe's". It is the same family that owns ALDI in Scandinavia
I know this vid is old by now, but MENY definitely have 20 ounce Old El Paso cans of refried beans, and COOP has an 8 ounce from Santa Maria. Also Norwegian caviar is usually from cod.
Did you ever think that the reason you can't find more types of peanut butter in Norway has something to with the fact that Norway doesn't allow products with GMO's in it... and that it's not a very common food in Norway.
Tia Brewer they are polar opposites for me. Peanut butter is my favorite food of all time. Bruno’s is one of only a few foods I don’t like the taste of.
Sindre Ronningen I sincerely doubt that if the main reason. It’s more likely a cultural thing: Norwegian just don’t eat as much peanut butter so the market just isn’t there. By the way, 350g of 89% peanut butter costs 70p in the UK (cheapest, lowest quality option) but 350g of 82% peanut butter costs 21,90kr in Norway!
Ever heard of organic foods? Not everything is GMO 🤦🏻♀️ Also what I've seen so far of Norwegian staple foods it's SO processed & full of preservatives.
The produce area looked like a Sav-a-Lot. And I've seen fruit out at multiple supermarkets here. Sometimes chopped up or sometimes whole small apples, etc.
Hehe, yeah I'm in there all the time. You might have seen me but just didn't realize. ;-) the old boss spotted me and talked with me a few times. I'm glad you're enjoying my channel. I'm hoping to get some more time to make new stuff soon. Thanks for watching.
@6:27 I saw the organic peanut butter was 39.90, and thought, "40 bucks for a damn jar of peanut butter?!" Then, I remembered that Norway uses kroner and not dollars and the conversion comes out to about $4.70. >_
i don't know where you r in Norway. still you need to do a "harry tur" you need to spend one day in "Svinseund", "Norby shoping senter", and "Strømstad"
Most big stores have the automatic vending machine thing. Smaller stores,more rural places,have the painkillers etc behind tue cashier:) funny to watch!
Oh, below I left comments (2) I'm in NYS of USA ! We have Kieza & Rosemary , friends who live in Norway who have to take a ferry to island where they live! We met them in Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, MD- My grandson Riley, and Kieza had both same disease "Perthes" & were treated for that by Dr Shaun Standard who was taught by Dr Lopez in Portugal to be treated and both legs were the same length after 4 months after operation! (Very difficult medical procedure and very brave children who became best friends). We spent a lot of beautiful time with each other💟🙏❤️ During recuperating, the children were Allowed to go for a car ride if possible with walkers & wheelchairs! Our friends from Norway went to WholeFoods almost every day because
we do have new product sample stand with people from manufacturers here to, but the kind in the photos are a simplier to give you a taste so you probably will buy more?
For the fruit selection, you visited the wrong store ;-) Next time you're in Norwa,y drop by Meny Kolsås and check out my fruit selection where I work. I run a much bigger fruit and vegetables section in the store, much like your supermarket concept.
When you comment, maybe it would be a good idea to show more photos or videos about the products? Bread in Norway is ALWAYS made the same day as sold (unless the pre-sliced and labeled ones). I actually buy dry red/black beans and cook them myself with onions, chilipeppers and garlic. l soak them in water for 10-12 hours and rinse them well before cooking. The ready made beans are awful. I agree about peanut butter, but nobody likes it here in Norway. That's why you can't find lots of variations😊
There is one thing that surprised me when I was shopping in USA. The price tag in the shop was not the price I paid. They added tax to it! If it says 20,- then it is logical to pay 20,-. Isn't it?
Laila Ulvseth That is true. Although that changes from state to state. For example in Oregon there is no sales tax so the price you see is the price you pay. In California its the way you mention, the advertised price is before sales tax. I like that you pay what you see on the tag here.
Not sure if you can manage to get hold of it but as a Brit in Norway I managed to find the american favorite Skippy peanut butter in almost every Meny :)
It might be surprising, but I can't stand Skippy peanut butter. I am a big fan of natural peanut butter, basically crushed peanuts and a tiny bit of salt. I was very happy to see our local store had it.
Lol, we only use the Mills Peanut butter, if any.. :) No need for any more brands, they are only for show. And regards to taconight, And at my house, we like to mix it up. We are having taco night on monday instead of friday. And beans in the taco is no-no. Lol Fun to hear you talk comparison.
i live in a veeery small "town" it so small i don't think it even qualifies to be a town. but to the point. Since i live in such a small place, i know the cashiers 90% of the time so i always have a little chat with them
Just wanted to add some pointers :) -There's a lot of vegetarian food in the bigger cities, I've never found it an issue. - Brød means bread, it's not like Loff is it's own category. But the under categories of Bread is: loff, kneip and grovbrød. Kneip is the most popular one, because the grovbrød has too much flavor in my opinion and loff is just air and sugar. - Many people buy their hygiene products at the apothecary, they have higher quality and products for sensitive skin and without perfume, etc :)
+Dixxi91 Yes, loff is a category of its own, loff does not mean brød/bread. I am pretty sure my wife would have wacked me with a frying pan if I came home with loff when she asked me to buy brød.
![BLACK BAG - Official Trailer [HD] - Only in Theaters March 14](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Du0Xp8WX_7I/mqdefault.jpg)
As a Norwegian, this was very entertaining to watch man! Hope you're happy with our country. We sure are happy to have a fun guy like you :D
I think this is a really good video! You're very well informed and explain how many of the differences are based on culture (like the no small talk thing) with a very "that's just how they do things!" kind of attitude rather than being annoyed like I've seen a lot of people get in these kinds of videos and I really appreciate that!
It is just that most people are more comfortable with what they are accustomed to, which is fine. It is the natural human way.
Being Norwegian i learned a lot about how grocery stores are in the US through this video and i found it interesting.
I like the idea of more comparison videos.
oh cool! I'm glad you enjoyed it. I will definitely work on more. Is there anything in particular you are curious to see compared?
After watching this i'd really like to go grocery shopping in the US and go nuts with all the new fruits and exiting selections.
As an American living in Norway, you are right on. Only thing I would add, that I have not seen in the US are the pante machines for recycling bottles and cans. I miss American stores and variety. Not to mention opening hours.
Wow, you don't have pantemachines? The more I know about America vs. Norway, the more I feel like I don't know a thing about America xD But what do you do with all the bottles? Just throw them away with all the other plastic?
+Kevin F (Original Minifig) I actually saw "pante machines" in California when I was there last year!
I'm not entirely sure about all the states, but the west coast states definitely have pant/recycling machines. there is even redemption values embossed on the bottles and cans.
+Nullik Well, due to the fact that so many people have reason to come here, which is utterly destroying the country, I wish Norway never did find oil. Norwegians would have been much better off by themselves.
+Nullik
How hard to build roads in Tiny ( 42 925 km² Pop. 5 707 251), Pancake - flat Denmark, w.o. any real winter, V.S Norway ( Finnmark county 48 618 km² -Norway 385 178 km² Pop. 5 213 985 Modern worlds most(?) demanding land to build roads in ). Cost of Denmarks alcohol policy ..? Deep analysis much..? ExEMTNor
Fun to see your face in one of the bigest news papers in norway, with link to this videu. Suspecting you will get a bit more views this week. Well deserved!
the reason norwegian stores doesen't have more beans is that. they are so hard to squice out of tubes.
Hahaha good point.
Torben Johansen 😊
Made me chuckle.
The reason for the low variety in foods is
1. We don't want huge amounts of food waist.
2. Buy lokal food is preoritays. Eco friendly. Food getting flown in is not eco.
3. We DO have internet shopping.
4. The sit down policy is not rude, it's about how can we make make your working conditions/ergonomics as good as possible.
And you have to be 18 to buy over the counter medicine.
The un-sliced bread is baked the same day as you buy it in the store. The toast-bread that already are sliced can be a few days old:)
I'm Finnish and I just spent two weeks in Florida and this video mentions pretty much all the differences I noticed when comparing Finnish and American grocery stores. It seems like we are very similar to the Norwegians in this sense. One thing I noticed is that all the fruits and veggies were way more expensive in the US, for example the cheapest apples I could find were 1.4$/lb whereas you can often get apples for 1€/kg which is like 0.45$/lb in Finland. On the other hand stuff like sodas, cookies and other sugary stuff were way cheaper in the US. Maybe this has something to do with the prevalence of obesity there, heh. It's also weird that tax isn't included in the printed price in the USA, I think it's just easier to include the tax so you don't have to do mental math just to know the price you're really paying.
Yeah I was so happy to see that healthier food was more affordable than junkfood when I moved. Cheap junkfood is quite a problem in the US, in my opinion. I am also glad that the tax is included in the printed price here.
+tuzmo
There's probably somerules of thumb you can use like "Add about this many cents per dollar and you get a good approximation" or something. People get used to many things.
If you are a vegetarian, you can find a great selection of food in the immigrants stores:)
Standing for 7 1/2 hours is very straining, hence they sit.
Also, the machines with the painkillers also hold cigarettes to prevent exposure of bad stuff.
PS: Stores get fresh bread every day.
+PuroYO
It also makes shoplifting those items impossible.
That's one of the reasons the stores love them so much.
+HrHaakon Nah, they used to be behind the register and still is in some places..
FOUR peanut butters ? I am amazed there are that many in norway
lol
love the series !
Very interesting to watch.. :) We love seeing foreigners point of view on our society. Some shops will let you buy medicine while checking out, you just say what you need and they give it to you. And I wish you talked more about chocolate! Our chocolate is so good... but then again I'm biased. And I want to commend you for learning so much Norwegian.. that's really cool. I know most people in Norway will probably switch to English when they realize you're an American, which will make it more difficult for you to pick up on Norwegian. So kudos to you! :)
Oh, and I want to add something. If you miss US groceries, try and find a Meny shop. They're more rare, but they're part of a big chain of grocery shops as well. And their selection is much bigger. You can find American pancake mix, Ben & Jerries ice cream, different peanut butters, Hersheys chocolate and lots of other US items. :)
Republic3D Oh nice, I'm going to have to do some searching.
+Republic3D Our Freia, Oslo based factory, chocolate used to be good until it was sold to an American company and they "internationalized" the recepies. Remember how the Helnøtt tasted before, when it was made with dark chocolate?
I still think Freia chocolate tastes great, Walters Mandler is my favorite. :)
This was really fun to watch as a Norwegian, thank you! I've worked a couple of years in another food store chain in Norway, so let me know if you have any questions.
I think the Norwegian loff and British loaf are related. The word "loff" simply came to denote "British bread", since they eat a lot of white bread. If you want white bread, ask for "loff". (We eat it with shrimps, for instance.)
We had an American redditor visit us in Oslo once, and he was so thrilled about kaviar, so it's cool that you mentioned it:)
Also, the reason why we have so little variety of fresh produce is that it's historically pretty new to Norway (again IMO). My father (~60 years) was 12 years old the first time he saw an orange, but he grew up way up north. Here in Oslo (and other bigger cities), you will have greater variety, more vegetarians, and also immigrant shops that sells fresh produce for a fraction of the price (Norwegian greens are expensive even though it's subsidized by the govt.)
The typical Norwegian greens like carrots, potatoes, onion, cabbage, are mostly stuff that thrives underground. But we take pride in our strawberries.
Yeah Kaviar was an interesting find for me. Now it's a common food in my house. The strawberries are heavenly here .
Don't forget to mention to people to hit the bell button so we know when your video comes out otherwise we don't know. Thanks for the info on the differences of stores. I remember small talk isn't very common there but I would not like that at all!
I'm an American who moved to Norway 22 years ago. Obviously I shared a lot of the same surprises as you when I first got here, but after a while it all seem very "daglidags". I notice the differences more when I go back to the States for a visit!
Having grown up in Upstate NY, I've had worse winters there than here in Kristiansand!
I've watched a few of your videos and have enjoyed (and shared) your point of view.....looking forward to seeing the rest of your uploads :)
+Tim Howe I suppose it is a lot colder in northern Norway, but I was seriously expecting those East coast winter temperatures here. Although I'm not mad about it not getting that cold. :-)
Norway has better quality food items. . we do have brands that are familiar to us and we also have the cheaper alternatives like store brands and low price brands.. In the US the high quality brands were similar to our cheaper store brands, it just seems mass produced, very sugary with lots of preservatives.
Bear Kuma That is just propaganda to defend the prices and lack of variety.
If you ever had for example a beef anywhere else in the world, you would not say that our soggy "beef" is better quality. Monopoly like we have does not lead to better quality since people just have no choice but to buy whatever quality they put out.
bloxyman22 Norway has some of the strictest laws on how fresh and how much meat % a meat product should have, so yeah it's some of the worlds best, but the market is very lacking still.
+bloxyman22
I've had beef in quite a few places.
Norwegian meat overall holds a very good quality. It's just that people aren't willing to pay the money for the good stuff.
I think you're oversimplifying things a lot. It's not that we have monopolies (Although Lerøy should burn for their bullshit) so much that customers are often retards.
Sell them a fish fillet and they'll always want the tail end, even though the neck-end is better. (Because paying for the bone is bad. But that tail-bit that is all-skin is fine.)
It's amazing how much of the stupid shit people ask for that's just dump. If you ask for Entrecôte and they start sizing up slices thinner than a thumb, you have to stop them immediately and insist on thicker slices. It's just... Sad. So much really good stuff goes to waste because people want cheap ground beef and not better quality food. Nortura and TIne respond to what the market want, ultimately.
Just to go to the butcher, and you will get what you want :) Not Kobe tho :P
More expensive of course , but quality you will get
And:
Coop - Big stores- Allot of items, low/good prices. Most stores have separate counters with fresh meat/fish and warm food.
Kiwi - No fresh meat area. Small stores, low prices. Try to make good on vegetables
Rema 1000 - Same things as Kiwi but allot better in my opinion. Lowest prices and good selection.
Meny - Higher prices, but they have more special items, and they will order things for you if you need it. Altways fresh counters for fish, meats and warm foods. The chefs there will help you pick out anything you need.
I enjoyed your video. Pretty informative. I especially like the fact that most of what was discussed had video accompaniment, no matter how brief.
I love how thorough you are in your observations - welcome to Norway!
Just found your channel. I met my (now) wife in California 2 years ago and she moved to Norway with me. Going to show your videos to her. I am sure she'll really like them! :)
So cool! I hope she is enjoying Norway as much as I am. I know that some Californians would have a hard time with the weather.
Just found your channel and subscribed. You are doing a good job of filling in cultural and practical aspects of life in Norway that I have not found elsewhere. Please continue. Tusen takk! Ha det bra!
Takk!
The clerks at Central Market stores in Texas will provide you with fruit samples if you ask. They all carry paring knives and are quick to cut off pieces of fruit and share. Like your Norwegian markets, Central Market also puts up tables with samples of fruits they are pushing that day.
Det var veldig interessant å se ett amerikansk perspektiv på norske matvarebutikker
Tjukken33 skulle si mårpølse, men du har rett, ingen hest der.
Jeg er glad Walmart ikke får lov til å være i Norge.
The bread you slice yourself is fresh for the day, or made during night and late evening before store opening. The presliced bread has often been frozen and have a slightly longer shelf life.
The bagging is not because of lazyness, i just think it will go a lot faster for people to check out if they pack the bag themselves.
BUT, recently they actually packed the bag for me, twice in a row. That is so uncommon for me and i was surprised, the first time it probably was because there was not enough space for me to do it myself, the second time there were no customers, and they actually decided to do it for me :D so surprised!
Wow was that in Norway where they packed your groceries? That would be a surprise. I worked in a store in the US and we had special bag holders that made with very easy to bag things quickly and we even had certain techniques to bag quickly.
AMERiNORGE yeah, first time in my life someone actually packed my bag for me.
most stores now also require you the customer to get the bag yourself, you don't ask for it, customers do more themselves now than what they did before, i don't know why.
***** It actually has some to do with the store's politcy. In the store I used to work in Norway, I had to ask if the costumer if they wanted help with packing their groceries. The policy has to do with Norwegians being, either stubborn or really wanting to know in which bag every grocery is.etc
Davian Sunly AMERiNORGE No, this is because of the wages here. Stores can't afford to pay people $20USD per hour to pack groceries...
If you want a bigger selection of foreign food(foreign for Norway at least), you should go to the store named ''Meny''. Things are a little pricey, but as I said, they have a bigger selection of foreign food :)
And their bread is SO much better than what you get elsewhere.
Nice video man! Miss the norwegian food....good quality and half the amount of salt and sugar.....and the fish is a lot better in Norway...but I like it over here anyway :)
Fred if you are in the US the center of the US is far from the ocean and you won't see fish as much. East and West coast and maybe Minnesota, so many lakes so fresh water fish, you see better selections there.
We have a lot of the small chain-stores like Kiwi, Coop, Rimi, Rema, Bunnpris. They are small but usually have everything needed on a daily basis and there is always 1-3 within walking distance. We do also have some really huge stores, similar to the american ones, like OBS that basically fills half a mall, with one floor for groceries, one for sports equipment, one for building equipment and maybe a café. There are usually a few of these in each of the cities, but they're usually in a mall and not as close to most homes.
Bread is baked fresh, either early in the morning, or the day before. Old bread is thrown out by the end of the day.
If you can't start working at 0600 you cannot be a baker. ;)
EDIT:
The reason there is not a lot of produce is partly because of the small-town thing (I live in Bergen, my local Coop Extra has 8-12 different types of potato. And... one type of Banana.), and partly because the local cuisine doesn't have all that many different vegetables in it. There's a slow revival going on though.
As for the candy section, candy lasts for ~6 months at least. So having more shelf space for it isn't hard. But if you have 50 different types of fresh ham, then a lot of those will go bad, costing you money. So that's a thing.
+HrHaakon 0600? Try 0200 or 0300. Thats when the real bakers start. 0600 is when the bakeoff bakers in the groceries start.
+chris86simon
The stores don't generally open until ~0900, and alcohol isn't sold until then either. You can easily have the bread ready at that 0800, and shipped out by 0830, and in the stores on time.
HrHaakon Yes, and? Real bakers still are up at 2 or 3 am.
+chris86simon
When I worked as a baker, I started at 0500.
+HrHaakon its all about the delivery time to the different stores you will deliver to, I start baking at 2300 and at 0600 the bread are on the way to the stores
aww this makes me miss norway! I visited in 2013 for 3 months...LOVEDDDDDD it!! I was in Bodo, Norway soooooo incredibly beautiful!!
+Lisa Salvo bodø is awesome during summer. i love the midnight sun :)
me too!! It was hard getting adjusted to tho! Im going back to Bodo...maybe this summer:)
+Lisa Salvo Bodø is probably one of the best places in the world!! (in my opinion)
sigve hollås I agree!! I LOVE it!! Im planning on going back to visit this summer or next:)
You are wery welcome bak Lisa :)
+AMERiNORGE When in Oslo, check out the produce shop in Mathallen. In the aisles in the back of the shop, they have all sorts of American brands of peanut butter, refried beans, mustards, US sodas etc I haven't seen anywhere else - they even have cans of Manwich :)
5:40
In Canada we have a lot of those bread slicers in most of the grocery stores here. Other smaller grocery stores tend to just have pre-sliced bread.
And in grocery stores you do your own bagging. In supermarkets and big box stores like Wal Mart, the cashier does that. So it depends where you go.
At HEB in South Texas they leave out food often by itself (especially bread and fruit) to sample without anyone there...Breads will be in bags by the bread and fruit sometimes in produce. We also have the open whole bread that you can request to have sliced.
Also, how you have to leave the shopping basket and the little cart at the checkout; cigarettes and snooze are picked up at the machines which are usually located past the checkout register area:)
As a Norwegian I really enjoy these videoes :P
Also worth noting that not all stores have these wending machines for medicine. Most places it's common having to ask the clerk for whatever product and then he'll scan it provided you're above 18 of course.
The bread is usually baked in the morning and then sent out to the stores before opening hours. Fresh is key in most Norwegian food, people joke about eating the tail-end of the fish first because that came out of the ocean the shortest time ago.
Nobody uses beans on their Tacos ;) that's why the selection is so low.
Janet for fucks sake, in Norway I mean. And we dont have beef on tacos either.
Du bruker jo storfe som er fra kua som igjen er Biff? det er det kjøttdeig er laget av smarting
Janet Browning Don*t take the cussing to hard. It's really common in Norway to use cuss words, and it's not considered offensive in the same way it would in the US. Although I do agree it's uncalled for.
@@janetbrowning9089 Janet Norwegians swear a lot just how they talk. Not nasty, just conversation.
@@TheEminemOwns Thanks for the info...had no idea...but, yes, doesn't seem to be needed really.😊
Thank you for pointing out that it is not rudeness when we don't small talk, it is just the way we are! :)
I think the largest difference between Norway and the US is that there aren't TV ads for drugs in Norway. To my understanding only the US and New Zealand have that type of advertising.
I'm vegan, and I live in Bergen. Here it's pretty easy. I tried going fruitarian (raw till four) for a while, but it became to expencive even though I went to the immigrants store (I'm a student). However, if you live of simple and whole foods like potatoes, rice, beans, vegetables, fruits, etc., it's possible anywhere. Most small stores even have plant based milks. Where there is will, there is a way! :)
About the refried beans, as you stated, the Norwegian taco night is texmex. It's americanized, only picking the most unhealthy and appealing foods.That sort of means they put as little vegetables in as possible, and fill it with meats, sour cream and cheese. That's why the refried beans boxes are so small.
Interesting video!
Having as little vegetables as possible is definitely not my experience with texmex/Mexican food in in the US. There has always been a nice amount of grilled and fresh vegetables when I've had it
AMERiNORGE Sorry, that was probably badly formulated. Anyways, that's how many Norwegians do it.
idapeppp You being a vegan probably affects your view of taco negatively. It's not about picking the most unhealthy food, that's just a stupid thing to say. And of course meat is unappealing to you, you're a vegan. That's not the case for others. There is also lots of vegetables, I've never seen anyone eat tacos without them.
gonna check out all your videos. My daughter may be moving to Bergen soon and I'm nervous for her. We are from Indiana USA. Thanks for this video. I will be watching the rest of them tonight.
Nothing to worry about Mark Bergen is a nice city but it rain wery much there but it is safe as Fort Nox so dont worry .) And peoples are nice and helpful when you get to know them.
Your list is very similar to the one my wife (who is Canadian) has compiled in her time here. Luckily, over time, we have managed to source mac'n'cheese, proper (hellman's) mayo, chunkless jam and smooth peanut butter to satisfy her American cravings. (All at our local Coop Extra) :P "Real" American items seems to be a growing category in Norwegian grocery stores, with the selection and prevalence here having grown markedly over the last five years.
One interesting thing: The vending machine for pharmacy goods (and tobacco items and razor blades) seems to be going away. It used to be everywhere, but now I can't remember seeing one in ages. The practice practically everywhere I shop is that those items are now in a closed off box behind the counter (some stores have small displays with their selection of medical items, but never tobacco) and you ask for what you want. The clerk then unlocks the cabinet and adds the chosen item to your pile'o'goods on the belt.
haha it's funny you mention mac'n'cheese we found that our local place started selling it recently and had to get some of course.
Great video! I'm from Norway (and live here), so it was interesting to hear your opinion on culture difference/your experience being here. I definitely agree with you about the lack of variety (it's something we've been complaining about the last few years). Just to point out that the machine with painkillers and stuff you mentioned is not in all stores, if i want painkillers/smoke etc i have to ask the clerk as it's all stored behind him/her (Kiwi). Looking forward to more videos, subscribed!
kenichisan88 Cool Thank you for the sub. More videos to come. :-)
11:00 Horse meat is NOT common in Norway, through my 22 years of living in this country I have never ever seen it.
It's listed as an ingredient in many pålegg. You will be surprised to find you have probably been eating it without knowing.
+EirikXL Yes, it is...
You find it in spekepølse, the black one
@@kirstenh9865 It is called Stabburpølse. :-))
SY NORSE Also Svartpølse from Grilstad 😉
Our company tried electronic tags but they had many issues. 1) they didn't work well in the freezer cases 2) the tags were hard wired and you would lose prices on whole aisles. 3) the stocking crews would damage the hardwired cables when stocking the shelves. Until they come out with wireless tags they will not be more common in stores.
The ones used here are wireless and battery operated.
I used to work in a grocery store in Norway, and it costs 250 Norwegian kroner for 1 of those electronic "price tags". A normal medium sized store in Norway has about 2500 different groceries.250kr x about 2500 is a lot of money
Davian Sunly That is quite expensive! I think it's one of those long term savings situations. The alternative is the 100's of thousands of tags that have to be printed on a yearly basis. The paper and printer ink/toner quickly adds up too. That and the extra time it takes to swap out the tags, they have to pay wages for that extra time. So I think they end up saving money for the company. Plus it's better for the environment and that always looks good. ...still that is a large chunk of money wow. I wonder if they get a better bulk price and it only costs 250kr to replace individual displays.
AMERiNORGE Fun fact about the price tags (both paper and digital): it's by law that the prices have to have listed the price per quantities. Like, how much it costs per kilogram, per litre, per wash (For washing products). This is because it's easier to compare the prices to between brands/products that have different size of packaging.
Davian Sunly the labels in rema 1000 only cost about 25 nok, so they are not so expencive. the ones they have in kiwi/coop and meny cost about twice. (50 NOK)
What a fun video - well done! I have to say, I live in Oslo and I hate going to the local grocery store, because there's hardly anything in there I want to eat. They never have all the vegetables that I need, the produce stand is often a sorry sight. They don't carry organic meat or other quality foods. I don't have a car since I live in the inner city, so it's quite a hassle to find all the food I need. Luckily I like caviar too! Organic peanut butter is relatively new in grocery stores, so you were lucky with that one ;)
Thanks, I'm glad you liked it. I too wish the vegetable selection was bigger. I was so delighted to see the organic peanut butter
misserene In inner Oslo you have all the immigrant stores with vegetables in Oslo (Grønland/Tøyen). They have a big selection in my opinion
Of course, but it's still a hassle to have to go to several different places to get the most basic foods.
Great vid, funny to see what an American thinks. As of now, I subscribe to your channel.
I have also been missing the bigger cans of beans in stores here. In Coop you get some beans in chili sauce that is kind of good, and that can be used with tacos. But I wish we could have some big cans of refried beans.
Kenneth Wiger Thank you for the sub. :-) I have tried the chili beans and actually one time I mashed them up with the sauce they come with to try and make some refried beans. It wasn't the same, but it was pretty good.
The internet needs to know what youre up to. We demand more videos!
Great channel!
About the medicine, they dont give you a new receipt, they simple scan the code on the one you already have, and that code then gets active on the vending machine
About the bagging: My friends and I went on a (awsome) five week road trip through the US and we were surepriced that we did not have to bag our groceries. But we wish we could, because we always ended up with twice the amunt of bags that we needed (Toothpaste, orange, candy bar and a can of soda in one bag!? There is so much more room!) We actually used to bag the groceries more efficient when we got out of the stores.
Very interesting. The grocery store selling pain killers (Paracet, Ibux) and other non-prescription drugs is quite recent here in Norway. Some years ago you had to go to the apotek (pharmacy) to get that. Also getting drugs from a vending machine is unfamiliar to me. At Kiwi where I shop in Oslo, drugs are stored in a locked cabinet behind the cashier and you have to ask for it.
Do you have a word for pålegg in English? Pålegg covers anything you would put on a slice of bread. Pålegg in a tube is very convenient for travelling or a days hike in the outdoors. A slang word for it is "tytepålegg" (tyte describes the action that takes place when you squeeze the tube).
Candy diversity dwindles alot around Easter, Halloween and Christmas.
Now that's a fun fact that most People know
When I went to the US i found the snack section A LOT smaller than in Norway and also tasted worse xD This was in most stores across Florida.
if you go to the food store called Meny, they have peter pan peanut butter :D its really good!
Men da koster det deretter da Camilla Meny er jo den dyreste butikken man kan handle i :)
I guess the coop you were at was Coop Prix. Coop Prix and Kiwi are small stores with not a great selection in wares. They are no supermarkets. You should check out Meny or Coop Obs if you want to see how a norwegian supermarket looks like. With a much larger selection in wares.
Kron Yeah it was a Coop Prix but is now a Coop Xtra. I have now been to Coop Obs and that is way more familiar to the stores I'm used to.
Harris Teeter in the South, Ralph's in Southern California, Wegman's? They all have cup fruit samples in the fruit section.
I find it funny that bagging the groceries actually bothers you, I'd rather do it myself so I can sort them. All things that go in the fridge in one and so on, that way I know where things are when I unpack ^^
Also I work with sampling as a part time job, it happens more in the cities and like in America we usually sample new foods.
I try sorting that way too. I've even started to put things on the belt in the order I plan on bagging. I think the part that is hard for me is that I'm not used to doing it this way so I start to feel rushed then get flustered and all my organization goes out the window. LOL. For someone that has grown up never doing that, it's quite a shock. I'm getting used to it though so it'll be no big deal eventually.
As for samplers, I guess our location is just too small to have someone standing there. Every time there are samples out they are unguarded.
Yeah, and the fruit samples is common everywhere. The stores themselves sample fruits and "fresh food"(only in bigger stores where they sell fresh seafood, cooked chicken and so on) which usually does not come from a brand but a local producer or is made in the store. These samples are unguarded I guess it's because the rules for the stores are less strict, we have pretty strict rules when sampling and the rules vary depending on which company we sample for.
Good luck with the bagging, just stick to the small local stores where not everyone is buying loads ;) (It's way worse in the big ones, everyone is shopping for the entire week)
haha I think that's my second reason for not liking the bagging. We shop for the week or more at a time so we have several bags to fill. oh well I'll get the hang of it.
AMERiNORGE as a norwegian i also can get nervous packing groceries ,haha.. usually i buy little at a time but often..i don't know how the "entire week shoppers" do it .
I think the differences you mentioned are pretty accurate for almost any European cities/towns, because in Hungary our grocery stores are almost the same.
Oh one more thing. Not all stores has those vending machines. The pain killers will still not be on shelves for you to pick it up and take it with you. They are either in a vending machine like you say, OR they are in a shelf next to the clerk and you have to ask THEM for whatever it is that you want/need.
This was a wierd experience to watch a comparrison and see what we do different (I'm from Norway so yeah.) One little thing that is common though is that if the clerk know you he / she will chat with you, of course it will be brief but still. And sometimes they offer to bag your groceries as they scan them in to, mostly not of course but sometimes when the line is short (I don't get it) they do that for me.... But I find a lot of things I didn't think about in this video and it was funny :)
Nice video
Sorry for faulty english, not really my main tounge
+TrueMessedMind you did rather well :-)
The vending machine thing. Sometimes it's sold in the same way as the cigarettes and 'snus' (Which I just realized is ALSO placed in vending machines if they have them....) But normally you tell the clerk what you want, and they will take it down from a cabinet with tinted windows (Due to laws to prevent people from the temptation if they're trying to quit)
Whole Foods has samples of fruit sitting out just like what you showed from a Norwegian fruit sample plate. They have them all over the stores, in the cheese department, fruit department, etc. I've also seen it in Better Health.
I live in a smaller town in Norway, and when I make my tacos I usually buy either Kidney beans or Chili beans.. It's whole beans in a saucy substance. :)
I enjoy the chili beans. I will even smash them up sometimes and heat them in a frying pan to get them closer to being like the refried beans in the States. The flavor is a bit different because we use different type of beans to make refried beans but it still turns out pretty tasty.
All the problems with a little selection is because you seems to live in a very little town. Also some stores which have more employes, clerks often ask to help you bag your grocery. The thing with despensiers are so you don't have to show the entire store what you are getting
Yeah I am in a small town and know that selection can be better in the big cities. I was able to get to a Coop obs.
See the thing about our stores are that... If you ask for it, they will for the most part take it in.
An example.. I used to drink a lot of ice tea, and most stores have these powder ice tea bags where you just add water. Now the store that's closest to where I live had peach and lemon. I REALLY REALLY wanted the mango one, so I asked them to start taking that in. And within a week they had it in stock. (This was a Joker store in Akershus)
Now that isn't really a problem to take in either because.. well they won't expire for like years. So even if they were to have 50 left and I stopped buying them (which i have btw :p) it would still be okay because even though I was mainly the one that bought them other people would buy them from time to time as well.
I did give them a notice that I did stop buying them, becuase like i said i was the main person buying them and i'd buy a ton of them (I'd probably drink 3 in one day //= 3 liters).
Now with things that would expire quickly I think they would be more careful about taking it in, without being absolutely certain seeing how I actually haven't asked them to take in something that would expire relatively fast (within a month or shorter time). But the chance is that they would buy in a small amount of it to see if it actually would sell.
You should def try this. Now in regards to getting things that are made in other countries that isn't stereotypical for Norway I don't think you would get, but maybe a good variety of that brand/item you wish they had? :)
Anyways good luck with your groceries hunting! :D
P.S I really enjoyed this video! you should make more comparison videos
Coop has a few different "version" of their stores
Coop Mega is groceries and other stuff, Coop Bygg is house stuff, Coop Obs is only groceries.. I don't know how many there are.
Also bread! I visited my girlfriend's grandparents in Finland in a tiny cottage in the middle of nowhere near a lake, and a small store within walking distance had a larger selection of EVERYTHING! Like a full 10 meter aisle filled with different sorts of bread! It's like we don't want to give ourselves any options in Norway xD
I didn't know we had more than one type of peanut butter :'D
If you're wondering about the prices, they're Krones. So for Krones/USD it'd be:
10/$1.15 20/$2.30 30/$3.45 40/$4.61
I live in Michigan in the us, and we have a department store chain called khol's that has used the electronic price sticker system for several years now. it's so far the only store I've seen use it, though. Interesting about bagging your own groceries with the divider, we also have some self checkout lanes that have those, I didn't know it was a scandanavien thing.
I had some similar shocks when moving from US to Australia. Peanut butter? Bologna? MUCH less selection in a lot of things. Then there's the weird stuff like Vegemite and cordial. Similar snack shelves - I guess the corporate multinationals have sold those very well worldwide! But in the 15 years I've been here - Australian shops now look more and more like US ones.
In 2012 I was in Chicago, Manhattan, San Francisco, Austin and New Orleans, to mention some of the places I visited. I never noticed that the employees in grocery stores and supermarkets were talking more to the customers there than they do in Norway. Maybe they did, but without me noticing it. The only exception was a cashier who started to talk with the man in front of me about his physical appearance and if he used rollerblades in his job and stuff like that (and no, they did not know each other). Really weird.
As someone being born in the 70s, I'm old enough to remember when being a cashier was a job almost exclusively for women, and when I saw the first male cashier (those males who owned the grocery store was an exception) it looked a bit unusual for me. Kiosks and carts and that, that on the other hand employees of both genders.
Norwegian here, cool vid! I have to say I'm surprised neither price nor alcohol came up, I thought that was going to be *the* biggest factors.
Yeah, I'm not sure why I didn't bring that up. I plan on possibly doing another video on that in the future.
I live in Norway and those beans you are talking about.... we don't use them that mutch in tacos as americans. Maybie thats why you can find only one type of them?
I've lived in Norway all of my life and let me tell you, if you want more variety in Foods, you pretty much HAVE to go to the stores Meny, Coop Mega or CC Mat.
(These are only found in the bigger cities though).
All Three of them have a pretty huge variety of stuff, including fruits, vegetables, fresh meat, fish and hygiene products.
The smaller stores are good enough if you just need "something on the go", but other than that, I preffer to use "the big three" because of the greater variety.
I live about 45 min (by car) from these stores and I live in a small town.
As for peanut butter, I'm not sure about Jif, but I know Skippy is pretty easy to find here.
Also, schools here DO have cafeterias.
We usually have to buy the stuff we want though, it's not free.
At least that's how it was at my schools.
And finally something that I've just noticed:
The clerks usually stand in the smaller stores, while they sit in the bigger ones.
This makes sense though, as in the smaller stores in rural areas with less customers, they don't need to sit there all the time. The chair would only be in the way.
In the bigger, more busy stores in the urban areas however, the clerks need to stay put behind the checkout for a longer period of time which is why sitting comes in handy.
This only applies to grocery stores though, in all other stores the clerks will always stand behind the counter.
When it comes to the clerk putting your stuff in the bags, I think it is much better how it is here.
Are we really this busy/lazy that we can't do this ourselves?
I'm sure the clerks have better things to do, like keeping the store tidy or taking care of the customers after you.
What do you do after paying anyway? Just stand there and wait? No thanks.
Btw, your groceries won't get mixed up, because they have a separation thingy.
The clerk won't just send the next customers stuff down to your stuff.
The reason we dont have people to guard the samples, bag our bags and so on is because that would be to expensive for the stores! ;) Im sure you already know that the people working in stores in Norway have a pretty good hourly wage, I would say its around 15-16 usd in grocery stores.
+MegaHannah86 This has nothing to do with the wages itself, but rather the fact that the socioeconomic differences in Norway are relatively low. The hourly wage in Norwegian grocery stores can be $100 as an example, but with socioeconomic differences like the United States, workers packing the customer's bags would be a much more common site in Norway as well.
I have heard that shopping in Norway is quite expensive, and that people go to Sweden for better prices.
Yes that's very common especially for tobacco. (If you go to Sweden don't bye chocolate)
Do you even do your own chocolate in Norway? Just milk chocolate must be expensive AF! Some people here though want to close the border to Norway I can't really deny being one of them ;) *Grabs popcorn*
Actually, Norway's got fantastic chocolate. A company named Freia which creates magnificent chocolate. When they expanded into Sweden, they changed their name to Maribou because of copyright reasons, and I thiiiink it's a fairly well known chocolate brand?? Moreso than Freia, anyway, but Freia chocolate is absolutely fantastic :P And I'm not even a big fan of chocolate.
*****
Fuck off m8 we got cloetta! :P We have kexchoklad and center etc. Yes we have marabou, and people buy it BUT it doesn't beat kexchoklad! :P
We've got a thing called Kvikk lunch, which is made by Freia. It is literally you're inferior kex with our master-race chocolate. your argument is invalid sir...
You forgot one crucial thing about grocery stores, panting.:D
It's awesome.
In Sweden they have a bigger selection, except in hard discount stores like Netto and LIdl (like the American Save a'lot).
In Norway there are some well selected stores in Oslo, (Jacobs, Centra and so on has about 100 000 different items), but the average store has reduced its inventory from 25 000 different items to around 10 000, and Rema and KIWI are at around 3000.
Have you tasted "makrell i tomat"? (Mackerel and tomato sauce), and is that a thing in the US?
I have tasted it and I love it! As a matter of fact I eat at least one can a week now.
AMERiNORGE Cool! I love it too, it's both healthy and it tastes good.
Never heard of it!
Smells like shit
No.
Thank you Ronald.
Always love your videos
This one is great. Our grocery store chains (the big multiple location stores) sell the same type of crap in California. The best store chain is a German owned and managed small store called 'Trader Joe's". It is the same family that owns ALDI in Scandinavia
I know this vid is old by now, but MENY definitely have 20 ounce Old El Paso cans of refried beans, and COOP has an 8 ounce from Santa Maria. Also Norwegian caviar is usually from cod.
Did you ever think that the reason you can't find more types of peanut butter in Norway has something to with the fact that Norway doesn't allow products with GMO's in it... and that it's not a very common food in Norway.
Sindre Ronningen there’s brunost it tastes similar
Tia Brewer they are polar opposites for me. Peanut butter is my favorite food of all time. Bruno’s is one of only a few foods I don’t like the taste of.
Sindre Ronningen I sincerely doubt that if the main reason. It’s more likely a cultural thing: Norwegian just don’t eat as much peanut butter so the market just isn’t there. By the way, 350g of 89% peanut butter costs 70p in the UK (cheapest, lowest quality option) but 350g of 82% peanut butter costs 21,90kr in Norway!
@Jo Gill Why would you try to comment on anything when you can't spell or construct a short sentence?
Ever heard of organic foods? Not everything is GMO 🤦🏻♀️ Also what I've seen so far of Norwegian staple foods it's SO processed & full of preservatives.
The produce area looked like a Sav-a-Lot. And I've seen fruit out at multiple supermarkets here. Sometimes chopped up or sometimes whole small apples, etc.
Omg, you actually live in my hometown, thats so exciting!! And thats my work place, so weird I havent seen you, love your channel!
Hehe, yeah I'm in there all the time. You might have seen me but just didn't realize. ;-) the old boss spotted me and talked with me a few times. I'm glad you're enjoying my channel. I'm hoping to get some more time to make new stuff soon. Thanks for watching.
@6:27 I saw the organic peanut butter was 39.90, and thought, "40 bucks for a damn jar of peanut butter?!"
Then, I remembered that Norway uses kroner and not dollars and the conversion comes out to about $4.70. >_
$40 is like 400,- (kr) or so in Norway
i don't know where you r in Norway. still you need to do a "harry tur" you need to spend one day in "Svinseund", "Norby shoping senter", and "Strømstad"
Most big stores have the automatic vending machine thing. Smaller stores,more rural places,have the painkillers etc behind tue cashier:) funny to watch!
In most hospital cafeterias in the US the cashiers do sit but not many other places on average
Oh, below I left comments (2) I'm in NYS of USA !
We have Kieza & Rosemary , friends who live in Norway who have to take a ferry to island where they live! We met them in Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, MD-
My grandson Riley, and Kieza had both same disease "Perthes" & were treated for that by Dr Shaun Standard who was taught by Dr Lopez in Portugal to be treated and both legs were the same length after 4 months after operation!
(Very difficult medical procedure and very brave children who became best friends). We spent a lot of beautiful time with each other💟🙏❤️
During recuperating, the children were
Allowed to go for a car ride if possible with walkers & wheelchairs! Our friends from Norway went to WholeFoods almost every day because
we do have new product sample stand with people from manufacturers here to, but the kind in the photos are a simplier to give you a taste so you probably will buy more?
For the fruit selection, you visited the wrong store ;-) Next time you're in Norwa,y drop by Meny Kolsås and check out my fruit selection where I work. I run a much bigger fruit and vegetables section in the store, much like your supermarket concept.
I'm sure the closer to Oslo I get the better the selection will be. We live in a relatively small area so everything is minuscule here.
When you comment, maybe it would be a good idea to show more photos or videos about the products? Bread in Norway is ALWAYS made the same day as sold (unless the pre-sliced and labeled ones). I actually buy dry red/black beans and cook them myself with onions, chilipeppers and garlic. l soak them in water for 10-12 hours and rinse them well before cooking. The ready made beans are awful. I agree about peanut butter, but nobody likes it here in Norway. That's why you can't find lots of variations😊
There is one thing that surprised me when I was shopping in USA. The price tag in the shop was not the price I paid. They added tax to it! If it says 20,- then it is logical to pay 20,-. Isn't it?
Laila Ulvseth That is true. Although that changes from state to state. For example in Oregon there is no sales tax so the price you see is the price you pay. In California its the way you mention, the advertised price is before sales tax. I like that you pay what you see on the tag here.
AMERiNORGE exept if there is pant on the bottle. That can be annoying.
Sei Kai ok I mixed Norwegian and english there.
+Sei Kai the price tag says "+pant".
This was fun. When i wisited the USA some months ago i was suprised people bagged for me. I am so used to do that myself.
-i am frog norway btw ;)
Not sure if you can manage to get hold of it but as a Brit in Norway I managed to find the american favorite Skippy peanut butter in almost every Meny :)
It might be surprising, but I can't stand Skippy peanut butter. I am a big fan of natural peanut butter, basically crushed peanuts and a tiny bit of salt. I was very happy to see our local store had it.
Lol, we only use the Mills Peanut butter, if any.. :) No need for any more brands, they are only for show.
And regards to taconight, And at my house, we like to mix it up. We are having taco night on monday instead of friday. And beans in the taco is no-no. Lol
Fun to hear you talk comparison.
i live in a veeery small "town" it so small i don't think it even qualifies to be a town. but to the point. Since i live in such a small place, i know the cashiers 90% of the time so i always have a little chat with them
Just wanted to add some pointers :)
-There's a lot of vegetarian food in the bigger cities, I've never found it an issue.
- Brød means bread, it's not like Loff is it's own category. But the under categories of Bread is: loff, kneip and grovbrød. Kneip is the most popular one, because the grovbrød has too much flavor in my opinion and loff is just air and sugar.
- Many people buy their hygiene products at the apothecary, they have higher quality and products for sensitive skin and without perfume, etc :)
+Dixxi91 Yes, loff is a category of its own, loff does not mean brød/bread. I am pretty sure my wife would have wacked me with a frying pan if I came home with loff when she asked me to buy brød.
Haha that is the true wifes hate loff !!!!