ST. PETERSBURG — About 150 people were waiting when the doors opened at 7 a.m. March 12 at the new Publix on 38th Avenue North. Some had been there since before dawn.
Art Brown, 73, arrived around 5 a.m. David Lessard, 61, got in line about 6:15.
Both were regulars at the old Publix on 66th Street — the store Publix demolished at the same site in 2024 to make way for this one. They also shopped occasionally at the Eagles Park Retail Center store on Park Street, which closed March 7.
“I’m hoping to see some of the employees who were dispersed,” Lessard said.
They did. Employees who transferred from Eagles Park and other locations greeted returning customers with hugs. Other staffers lined the entrance and gave shoppers a round of applause as they walked in.
The store at 6605 38th Ave. N., designated as Publix No. 2094, is a 55,454-square-foot supermarket that Publix built from the ground up on a site it owns at the corner of 38th Avenue and 66th Street. The company demolished the former Albertsons building there in September 2024 and started construction two months later.
The project is an $11 million investment, according to property records. It is the second of three former Albertsons locations the company is tearing down and replacing across the Tampa Bay area. A rebuilt Publix at 1295 S. Missouri Ave. in Clearwater opened March 5. A third project at Largo Mall closed Feb. 28 for demolition, with a rebuild expected to take 12 to 18 months.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony preceded the opening. Employees handed out free samples and shopping bags. Outside, a giant motorized Publix shopping cart — built on a Volkswagen Sand Rail frame, standing nearly 12 feet tall and weighing about 2,000 pounds — drew crowds and cellphone cameras. The Clearwater-based company Total Precision Fabworx built the vehicle, which Publix has used at store openings since 2023.
The new store includes departments for grocery, dairy, frozen food, seafood, meat and fresh produce, along with a full-service bakery, deli and pharmacy. An adjacent Publix Liquors is also on site. The deli area features an olive bar, though there is no salad bar. The store also has an indoor seating area where customers can sit and eat — a design element Publix has added to several of its newer locations.
The opening comes five days after Publix shut the doors at Eagles Park Retail Center, about two miles away. That closure left a shopping center already struggling with vacancies — at least 16 storefronts were empty before Publix departed — with a vacancy rate above 60%. The only significant remaining tenant is a Truist Bank branch.
The Eagles Park closure hit some customers hard. The store had been the closest grocery option for two 55-and-older communities and several mobile home parks nearby. The new 38th Avenue location is drivable but not walkable for those residents.
Publix, headquartered in Lakeland, is the largest employee-owned company in the United States, with more than 260,000 workers and about 1,430 stores in eight states. The company reported $62.7 billion in sales for fiscal 2025, a 5% increase over the prior year.