“There are some interesting shopping habits in this aisle,” he said, adding he had known rows between couples after a man had become “intrigued by a gadget or two”.
“I would say there are a lot of men in trouble when they come in here,” he said.
There are Facebook pages, Reddit threads and YouTube videos dedicated to middle-aisle finds.
“My mum came back with a two-man canoe despite not living near any suitable body of water,” one Reddit user posted on a thread about things people had found. “A flamethrower,” another user posted. “It was for getting rid of weeds.”
Aside from the middle aisle, Mr McDonnell said there had been a lot of early spend on mince pies, party food and panettone. He said Lidl had won a lot of new customers and many were in a “confident mood” for Christmas despite the tough economic backdrop.
Lidl has been freshening up the look of its stores, putting bakeries at the entrances and displaying more fruit and veg. Both categories have seen a jump in sales.
Amid cutthroat competition and price matching, Mr McDonnell believes the shopping experience is just as important as the price to keep pulling customers in.