This Kendall staple Publix is shutting down. Here’s what customers can do
Publix customers pulling up to the store at the Palms at Town & Country Mall in Kendall for their weekend shopping might have been surprised to see signs and banners on the front windows announcing that this anchor is closing to build a new store on-site.
If you scurried into a side entrance and somehow missed the message on another banner hanging near the outdoor ATM, banners draping empty shelves along several aisles inside the store were another tip-off.
The store, which opened at the outdoor strip mall off North Kendall Drive in 1985 at 8250 Mills Dr., won’t be restocking the missing items, which included pet toys and condiments in the spice aisle, because there’ll be no one to ring them up here for more than a year.
The store, a neighborhood Kendall grocery fixture for more than 40 years, is closing on Saturday, Jan. 17. Or, as the green banners touted, “Adding a fresh coat to our freshness.”
Publix’s corporate office confirms the store is permanently closing on its website. A Publix spokesperson has not responded to a request for details yet. Staffers, who say they have been reassigned to nearby stores during the shutdown and demolition, confirmed the closing.
Here’s what we know so far.
Publix future at Town & Country
There will be a new Publix in the space of the old one so Town & Country, which also has a new Barnes & Noble, Marshall’s, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Total Wine & More, EōS Fitness and Outback Steakhouse, will regain its grocery anchor, which opened in the year of the “Back to the Future” movie, Ronald Reagan’s presidency and the peak popularity of television’s “Miami Vice.”
- When this Publix closes: This store, which includes a pharmacy, closes for good at 7 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 17.
- When the new store opens: Publix hasn’t said but new rebuilds, which include demolition of the old stores, generally take a year to 18 months. For instance, the single-story, 32,000-square-foot Briar Bay Publix, which is across the street from The Falls mall and replaced a 1970s-era Hyde Park Market in 1997, was shuttered in 2022. Construction of that new Publix began in 2023. The new, 53,287-square-foot Publix — with two stories and a garage — opened at Briar Bay in February 2025.
- What will the new Publix look like? Publix hasn’t released details. Staffers said Saturday that the coming store won’t be a two-story version like The Falls-area rebuild or the nearly 46,000-square-foot, two-story, block-long Publix that opened at the old Riviera Plaza site in September 2025 at 1542 S. Dixie Hwy. Rather, the existing store will be rebuilt longer on both ends, we hear. Unlike those spaces, the Town & Country space is in the middle of the mall’s large corridor near a UPS Store and post office and other shops.
Where can you shop in the meantime?
Are you a loyal Publix shopper and you live in the Kendall area near Florida’s Turnpike and don’t want to drive too far for the next 18 months or so to feed that Pub Sub habit? Here are the nearby Publix stores that the chain suggests you visit in the meantime.
- Publix at Kendall Mall, 9041 SW 107th Ave.
- Publix at Market Square, 11750 SW 104th St.
- Publix at Higate Square, 13820 SW 88th St.
- Publix at the Crossings Shopping Village, 13001 SW 112th St.
This story was originally published January 10, 2026 at 2:54 PM.
