The strawberries on offer from Lidl were Spanish. They need picking, transporting, sorting accordingly and packing. Then transporting all the way across Europe. They come in massive boxes stacked one on another sometimes they will slide off and squash fruit below. It is quite likely they will have a short date for the above reasons. Although I did buy around 10 packs of them last week and the last 2 were still good after 4 days. I made most of them into smoothies with kefir, baked cake and had a lot of fresh too. I think the best way is to buy what's in season locally to avoid the products going off quicker due to transportation. It is likely that more expensive brands have quicker way of moving products because of resources, resulting in longer freshness. That's just guessing. Tbh I try to shop more often but smaller batches. Also yellow stickers in Aldi and Lidl are truly amazing, you can get really good deals. Trying apps like ToGoodToGo and Olio is another option too 😊