Mercadona – the supermarket where you can pick up more than groceries

When most people think of supermarkets in Portugal it tends to be one of the big three like Continente (Sonae), Pingo Doce (Jerónimo Martins), or Lidl (Schwarz Group).

You would not, probably, have automatically thought of Mercadona, the Spanish supermarket group that has expanded massively in Portugal, particularly in smaller towns in regional areas of the country.

But now Mercadona is on everyone’s lips, and is all over the news, and if you play your cards right, you might pick up more than just your weekly groceries shop at the Spanish supermarket chain if Tik-Tok and Instagram are anything to go by.

Because apparently, lingering in the aisles at Mercadona is the new pastime for singles looking for a date, providing you play by a certain set of rules, or rather visible shopping trolley codes.

It all began as a bit of a joke that went on to go viral on social media when a video post suggested that a solitary upturned pineapple and bottle of wine placed strategically in a shopping trolley means, well, to put it crudely ‘you’re up for it!’.

And aisle cruising, it seems, is better than online dating apps like Tinder, OkCupid, Bumble, Scruff or Manhunt (depending on your preference) because you get to ‘check out the goods’ in the flesh rather than spending hours chatting with a non-entity with a fake name and airbrushed photo taken 10 years previously.

Of course, there are very specific times when you should ‘loiter’ in the aisles; namely between 7pm and 8pm.

The initial video turned viral in Spain when well-known Tik-Toker Vivy Lin published a video asking her friend what the best time was, according to Google, to pick up a man at Mercadona.

To their surprise Google came back with an answer that there was indeed a specific time to find love in the supermarket chain.

Within a week the video went viral with 1.5 million views and ever since Mercadona has become the most spoken about supermarket on the Iberian peninsula.

And there are specific codes to follow depending what you’re looking for. Putting chocolates in your trolley means you’re looking for a casual, no-strings attached pickup, while packaged vegetables means you are on the lookout for something more serious and longer-lasting.

There are certain points in the supermarket you should head for depending on your age. If you are between 19-25 loiter around the frozen foods section, 25s-40s can linger around the fishmongers, while the over 40s should try their luck in the wine corridors.

And if you’re a man that likes a top-heavy woman, perhaps throw in a couple of large-size melons, and if you’re a woman looking for a man blessed in the pantry department….. I’ll leave that one to your imagination, save to say the fruit aisle and the colour yellow!

The question remains if these viral posts are simply a joke, or a well-thought out marketing strategy by Mercadona.

The company has remained tight-lipped, but given that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, and Mercadona is currently all that people can talk about, it’s certainly not doing the company any harm.

And it’s certainly nothing new. According to Retail Week, the UK supermarket chain Asda told The Sun newspaper back in 2011 that research showed that 71% of men and 64% of women claim to look for love in the aisles before anywhere else.

It prompted Asda to launch a dating website called Asdadating.com which actively encourages people to flirt while they shop!

Asda says on the website: “Research reveals the supermarket has overtaken the pub and the internet as the nation’s number one spot to find love.”

It added: “Supermarkets have always been a great way for singles people to meet. So it makes sense that if you’re now shopping online for your groceries, why not find love online too?”

So, my money’s on this being a copy-cat marketing ploy from Mercadona who paid the Spanish influencer Vivy Lin to keep the supermarket in the public eye. Well, either way, it’s certainly worked!

Photo: Freepiks.