Publix Debuts Alabama DC

Publix Super Markets has opened a distribution in Alabama, which it plans to staff with 300 associates by the close of the year, according to a published report.

The 638,000-square-foot facility, located in Jefferson County, between Birmingham and Tuscaloosa, will deliver items to 80 stores in Alabama and Tennessee to start, adding supermarkets in Georgia and the Florida Panhandle later this year, Alabama NewsCenter reported. The grocer took over space that was originally occupied by OfficeMax, and, according to the report, hired as many as possible of the OfficeMax workers affected by the closure.

“This puts us in a better position to serve our customers,” Mike Smith, SVP of industrial operations at Lakeland, Fla.-based Publix, told the publication. “It brings us a little bit closer to the stores we’re responsible for. We’re planting roots in communities.”

Brenda Reid, Publix’s media and community relations manager, added that the already available space permitted the grocer to complete the project sooner “That is a blessing that we didn’t have to build from the ground up, so we were able to come in and retrofit the equipment and bring in the new equipment that we need,” she noted in the report.