I took the same shopping list to Trader Joe's and Target. The bigger chain had more sales but still cost me way more.

I usually pick up a premade salad kit at the store, so that's where I went first.

Trader Joe's sells packaged salads for $3.69, which I consider cheap based on the amount in each bag. I went with a Southwest chopped salad.

Target offered similar salad kits, so I grabbed a Southwest-inspired bag from its Good & Gather line for a fair comparison.

It was $3.79, which isn't a big price difference, but it's good to know I can save a little bit on a nearly identical bag at Trader Joe's.

Plus, the Trader Joe's salad pack is 1 ounce larger than the Good & Gather one.

I run through cucumbers quickly because they're my go-to snack, so I always look for packs of mini varieties.

Trader Joe's offered a pack of six Persian cucumbers for $2.49.

I was surprised that Target sold a bag of six mini cucumbers for an identical $2.49.

The only downside was that they're packaged by the pound, so it might not be guaranteed that six come in every pack.

I love salmon, but it can be pricey, so I'm always searching for the best deals.

The salmon fillets at Trader Joe's were priced at $9.99 a pound, which is on the lower end of what I typically see at stores.

Both salmon packages (plain fillets and one with a premade lemon-pepper butter) I found at Target were 10 ounces and cost $9.99.

There are 16 ounces in a pound, so even though the prices seemed similar, I could get 6 more ounces of fish at Trader Joe's for the same price.

I've already compared ice-cream prices at different chains, so this trip, I opted for mochi as my frozen dessert.

Trader Joe's had about six different flavors. Each box had six pieces of mochi for $4.99, which was cheaper than I expected.

Although Target sells boxes of My Mochi mochi for $5.99, luckily, they were on sale for $4.49 during my trip.

Like the Trader Joe's boxes, these each contained six pieces. However, Target only offered three flavors, so there wasn't as much variety.

I love shredded-wheat cereals, so I landed on Trader Joe's frosted version, which is similar to Kellogg's Frosted Mini-Wheats.

The box was only $3.49, but it was on the smaller side at just over 20 ounces. It worked out to about $0.17 an ounce.

I could only find family-size boxes of Kellogg's Frosted Mini-Wheats at Target, but luckily for me, they were on sale.

Each 24-ounce box is typically $5.89 (about $0.25 an ounce), but I got two for $9 ($0.19 an ounce).

I'll definitely go through two boxes of my favorite cereal, and the price per ounce worked out to be very close. But without the sale, I'd probably stick to Trader Joe's overall cheaper box.

Clif bars are my favorite on-the-go snack, and I love that Trader Joe's sells them individually.

Each bar is only $1.39, and I can mix and match flavors and grab as many as I need for the week.

I didn't expect to find many individually sold energy bars at Target, but I was able to find 10-pack boxes of Clif bars.

Each one was $13.99, which is the same price I'd pay if I bought 10 at Trader Joe's. But overall, I prefer buying them individually so I can choose how many (and what flavors) I get in any given week.

I found a trail mix I hadn't seen before at Trader Joe's.

The "trek mix" had cashews, macadamia nuts, almonds, freeze-dried pineapples, and dried cranberries and cost $6.79 for 14 ounces.

That works out to about $0.49 an ounce.

I couldn't find a trail mix with freeze-dried pineapples at Target, so I opted for one with blueberries.

The $6.49 bag was cheaper but also smaller at 9 ounces. That's about $0.72 an ounce.

The price per ounce was nearly a $0.30 difference.

Trader Joe's sells a plethora of ground coffee, but I usually opt for its French roast.

The bag costs $5.99 for 13 ounces ($0.46 an ounce), which I think is on the cheaper side for a dark roast.

Although I couldn't find a Target-brand French blend, all the Good & Gather bags seemed to be 12 ounces for $7.69, or about $0.64 an ounce.

The store didn't have my preferred roast — but if it did, a bag would cost me almost $2 more for an ounce less of coffee.

In Trader Joe's chip aisle, I found a 5.5-ounce bag of cheese puffs resembling crunchy Cheetos that cost $2.49, or about $0.45 an ounce.

That seemed like a good price to me, and I liked that there was a reduced-fat option.

I found an 8.5-ounce bag of crunchy Cheetos at Target for $5.19, or about $0.61 an ounce.

Since the snack is just for me, I'd much rather pay less and get the smaller bag.

For a quick and easy dinner, I always opt for Asian-inspired or ramen noodles.

Trader Joe's sells a four-pack of spicy garlic and sesame noodles for only $4.99.

Although I could've opted for singular pouches of spicy noodles at Target, I wanted to find a similar-size package with the closest ingredients.

The only pack of spicy garlic and sesame noodles I could find was from Momofuku and cost a whopping $11.69. That wasn't all that surprising though, since the restaurant brand is known for being pricey.

If I wanted to put together my own pack, I could've bought four of the individual NongShim spicy noodle packs for $1.79 each, but that still works out to $7.16.

My list cost $58.90 at Trader Joe's, and the same items (some of which were on sale) were $74.81 at Target.

Although I preferred the offerings and deals at Trader Joe's, grocery prices and store availability are constantly changing variables. Plus, this comparison didn't even take things like proximity, company ethics, or accessibility into account.

There are plenty of reasons I could see someone preferring Target based on their needs. However, for now, the only reason I'd return to Target for groceries is for its sale items. That's the only time its deals really seemed to outweigh Trader Joe's.