Publix history

In 1935, he opened a second location across town.

On November 8, 1940, his "food palace" opened at 199 West Central Avenue, having piped-in music, air conditioning, cold cases for frozen and refrigerated items, in-store doughnut and flower shops, and electric-eye automatic doors.

In 1945, he acquired a warehouse and 19 All American stores from the Lakeland Grocery Company.

Hollis began with Publix in 1946 as a bag boy at age 12 and had worked as a stock clerk and a produce and store manager.

After relocating headquarters to Lakeland, the company constructed a 70,000-square-foot store there in 1950.

In 1951, Publix moved its headquarters from Winter Haven to Lakeland, Florida, and built its first distribution warehouse there.

In 1956, Publix achieved $50 million in sales, and $1 million in profit.

In 1957, the donut shop in each store was expanded into a full-service bakery.

Publix's success in less developed parts of Florida encouraged Jenkins to move into the lucrative, but highly competitive, Miami market in 1959.

In 1963, the firm opened a warehouse to service the growing number of supermarkets it was opening there.

1964: Publix opens its 100th store in Winter Haven, Florida.

By 1966, as more women began to work and more people remained single, stores shifted from one small frozen-food display case to large, upright cases with glass doors.

In 1967, Publix added office space to the front of the building, which expanded the entry and lobby, as well as both ends of the building.

In 1976, Publix introduced in-store photofinishing, giving away a roll of film or an extra set of prints with each roll it developed.

In 1979, the company reached nearly $2 billion in sales and had 234 stores and 26,000 employees.

Jennifer B. has been with Publix since 1980, when she started working part time in high school.

Sales grew to $2 billion in 1982.

In 1985, all but three of the discount Food Worlds were closed, unable to give workers a percentage of their store's profits and turn a profit for Publix.

To increase flexibility in merchandising and marketing, Publix dropped S & H Green Stamps in the Lakeland and Jacksonville divisions in June 1987.

Along with constructing a dairy processing plant in Deerfield Beach, Publix also opened 30 new stores in 1988.

George Jenkins handed managerial control of Publix to his son Howard in 1989.

In January 1990, after suffering a stroke, George Jenkins retired as chairman and chief executive of Publix and became chairman emeritus.

In August 1991, with 384 stores, the firm announced that it was looking for sites in Atlanta.

Sales in 1992 exceeded $6 billion.

Publix was named one of the top ten companies in Fortune's 100 Best Companies to Work for in America in 1993.

By 1994, Publix had snapped up 10.1 percent of the market, trailing only Kroger and Winn-Dixie, whose market shares nonetheless dropped as a result of Publix's performance.

On October 5, 1995, Publix opened its 500th store in Miami, Florida.

In 1996, the firm moved into Alabama for the first time.

However, the settlement in January 1997 of the first of its class-action suits for $81.5 million, the fourth largest such settlement in United States history, took a huge chunk out of the company's earnings.

In 1998, it pulled in $12 billion in sales and $378 million in profits.

Publix acquired nine stores in Atlanta from the A&P supermarket chain in 1999.

The firm's profit margin climbed to a record 3.6 percent in 2000.

In 2001, the firm donated $2.1 million to the March of Dimes.

"publix announces annual results." business wire, 1 march 2002.

The deal was announced on June 9, 2008, and was completed on September 9, 2008.

On February 5, 2009, Publix opened its 1,000th store in St Augustine, Florida, becoming one of only five United States grocery retailers to achieve that number of stores.

In 2011, Publix announced it was expanding into North Carolina, initially by opening stores in the Charlotte metropolitan area, and later announced construction of a new store in Asheville.

Today, Publix has grown from a single shop into a sprawling collection of more than 1,100 supermarkets that brought in $34 billion in 2016.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Publix started working with the federal and state agencies and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) beginning in late January 2020.

Publix started to administer COVID-19 vaccines in early January 2021, with a 22-store pilot in the state of Florida with a focus on long-term care residents and staff, seniors, and health-care personnel.