the Tallahassee Democrat<\/a> reports that new Publix stores feature wider aisles, self-checkout lanes, and expanded delis, in addition to larger bakery, meat and seafood displays.<\/p>\nBut there is one thing all of these upcoming locations will likely be missing.<\/p>\n
WHAT\u2019S MISSING IN NEW STORES?<\/p>\n
More specifically, the company announced a while ago that its signature scales will not be made available in any of its new locations.<\/p>\n
These scales date back to 1930, when the first Publix store was opened in Florida.<\/p>\n
Mettler Toledo scale found in Publix stores (Copyright 2024 by WKMG ClickOrlando – All rights reserved.)<\/p>\n
In the chain\u2019s early years, it decided to make these scales free for customers to use \u2014 something that typically required money during this time because people didn\u2019t have scales in their homes.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur founder, having the vision to be a customer service expert, he thought having scales in the store without having our customers pay for it would be a treat \u2014 and it was,\u201d said Dwaine Stevens, who worked for Publix for around four decades.<\/p>\n
Photo of the first Publix location in Winter Haven (1940) (Public Domain)<\/p>\n
However, customers won\u2019t find any scales in Publix stores outside of Florida and Georgia. And that\u2019s because there are only a few left.<\/p>\n
Publix officials told News 6 that the scales\u2019 manufacturer \u2014 Mettler Toledo \u2014 stopped making them a few years ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe manufacturer ceased production in 2015, meaning that one day \u2014 although our wonderful repair shop keeps our remaining machines in great shape \u2014 the last Publix scale will retire,\u201d Publix wrote. \u201cWhen scales are taken out of a store, they go for a spruce-up in our repair shop. They could wind up going to another store, or they may be held for parts to utilize in other scales.\u201d<\/p>\n
No description found<\/p>\n
As a result, these scales won\u2019t be coming to new Florida stores, the company explained.<\/p>\n
Publix bought up as many of these scales as it could before Mettler Toledo stopped production, and the remaining scales are kept in stores or at a warehouse in Lakeland.<\/p>\n
[BELOW: Welcome to Florida\u2019s first-ever Publix store]<\/p>\n
The main technician at the warehouse said the scales last quite a long time. He worked on one that was built in 1971.<\/p>\n
The technician uses a Publix People Weigher Repair handbook. He said there are all types of repair issues, like when children swing on the arms and treat them like playground equipment.<\/p>\n
A Publix manager said the second most common reason people use the scales is to weigh their luggage on the way to the airport. That way they can know if it\u2019s too heavy before checking it with the airline.<\/p>\n
[BELOW: Publix has new BRISKET subs and people are SPLIT]<\/p>\n
According to Publix, the scales will stay in the Florida stores as long as the technicians can keep them operational.<\/p>\n
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Copyright 2026 by WKMG ClickOrlando – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORLANDO, Fla. \u2013 With roughly 900 locations already available in the Sunshine State, Publix has revealed its next…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277790,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[506,558,6919,28,30,29,575,3502,2159,139,557,7861,1911,2231,21956],"class_list":["post-277789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-broward-county","tag-business","tag-features","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-food","tag-ft-lauderdale","tag-money","tag-orlando","tag-palm-beach-county","tag-palm-beach-gardens","tag-polk-county","tag-publix","tag-winter-haven"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277789\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}