Four Florida Publix stores listed as 2026 closures had already closed

The four are in St. Petersburg, Miami, West Palm Beach and Palm Bay. The St. Petersburg store at 5577 Park Street N. closed on 7 March. A new $11 million, 55,454-square-foot Publix opened five days later, on 12 March, 2.8 miles away at 6605 38th Avenue N.

Three of the four are rebuild projects, according to Publix spokesperson Lindsay Willis. The Miami store at 8250 Mills Drive shut on 17 January after nearly 41 years and is being rebuilt. The Palm Bay store at 4711 Babcock St. NE closed on 11 July after nearly five decades so the aging building could be demolished for a new one. The West Palm Beach store at 828 Southern Blvd. closed on 26 September, about two weeks before the 12 October report; Publix plans to replace it, with no date announced.

The West Palm Beach store was one of the original five Publix locations in Palm Beach County, opened in 1959, and had been operating for 67 years. Employees were offered transfers to nearby stores, and the nearest Publix is at Belmart Plaza, 1.3 miles away.

Why Publix rebuilds instead of renovating

Building a Publix from the ground up, whether a new store or a replacement for a demolished one, can take 12 to 18 months, the Miami Herald estimated. Developer Shai Wolkowicki told Inc. that rebuilding can make sense when renovation costs approach the price of a new store, since a fresh building allows modern refrigeration and energy systems, better loading areas, space for online pickup and parking redesigned around current traffic.

The Palm Beach Post reported that losing the nearby store can be disruptive, particularly for retirement communities or lower-income areas where shoppers rely on public transit, and that the Publix may have been the area's only convenient pharmacy.

Willis said several factors drive such decisions. "Many times, it's simply so that we can rebuild a new one in its place that will meet the needs of customers now and into the future," she said in an email. Publix says it "replaces supermarkets and closes supermarkets that are not meeting performance expectations."

The 2026 closure lists

The Palm Beach Post reported that multiple news and grocery industry sites had listed the four as closing in 2026 because of lagging sales. The report did not name the outlets. Two Georgia stores that shut in December 2025 also appeared on several 2026 lists, the Economic Times reported.

Publix did not say sales performance drove any of the four closures. Its second-quarter sales rose 1% to $15.7 billion, while comparable-store sales fell 0.5%, the company reported. It attributed slower sales growth to Medicare drug pricing changes and "economic conditions impacting consumer spending."

Openings outnumber closures in Florida

Publix operates more than 1,440 stores across eight states, about 900 of them in Florida. In Florida, it has opened 16 stores this year, against the four closures. Those 16 are part of 26 new stores across several southern states. Six more were scheduled to open in Florida, Kentucky and North Carolina in the weeks after the report, including Bradenton on 22 October and Englewood on 5 November.

What happens next

Publix has not announced reopening dates for the Miami, Palm Bay or West Palm Beach stores.