Grocery Gamble

With an arsenal of high-end gastronomic personnel at his disposal, it would make sense to assume Dale Root runs a luxury resort, or at the least, a four-star restaurant.

The people who work for Root include a cheese monger and a wine steward. One associate is a former culinary manager for Ruth's Chris Steak House, while another employee worked the kitchen at the Sarasota Yacht Club.

Yet Root's workplace isn't a top resort. Nor is it an opulent casino. It's not even a restaurant.

Instead, Root is a store director for Winn-Dixie. Those employees are part of a massive transformation of the Sarasota store on Fruitville Road, just west of Interstate 75. The $5.6 million project covers everything from floors to ceilings at the 56,000-square-foot facility. It includes new refrigerated pod displays for produce and more than 40 new cases for frozen foods.

But at Winn-Dixie, traditionally on the low end of the grocery chain pecking order, the renovation is more like a revolution. Gone are dusty discount bins and dingy lighting. In its place: a wood-burning rotisserie, a Wi-Fi cafe and warm and vibrant colors.

“We wanted to create that wow when you walk in,” says Root, a 34-year Winn-Dixie employee. “This store was completely gutted.”
The corporate parent of Winn-Dixie behind the gutting, Greenville, S.C.-based Bi-Lo, takes the full-throttle approach so it can compete better with other area grocers. A Port Charlotte location underwent the same transformation, and several other Winn-Dixie stores, including a few in St. Petersburg, have had smaller renovations.

“We want to change the image of Winn-Dixie,” says District Manager Roberto Gonzalez, who oversees 17 Gulf Coast stores, from Pinellas County to Sarasota. “In the past Winn-Dixie had a little bit of a tarnished image.”

The list of Winn-Dixie competitors starts with Lakeland-based Publix Super Markets, which blankets the region with a roughly 50% market share. “Publix has been a strong and stable company for more than 80 years,” Publix spokeswoman Shannon Patten says. “We are always reviewing aspects like promotions, product mix and store environment in an effort to provide our customers with the best overall shopping experience.” 

Gonzalez, a 31-year Winn-Dixie employee, says Winn-Dixie emulates Publix. “We want to be as great as they are,” Gonzalez says. “We have a lot of work to do.”

Other local competitors include Walmart, Fresh Market and, coming to Sarasota in early September, Trader Joe's.

Both Bi-Lo and Winn-Dixie, meanwhile, are coming off bankruptcies. Winn-Dixie, which was formerly based in Jacksonville, where it was a local corporate leader, struggled for years before it filed for bankruptcy in 2005. It emerged in 2006. Bi-Lo filed for bankruptcy in 2009, and emerged in 2010. Bi-Lo bought Winn-Dixie late last year for about $560 million, and the combined entity now runs 688 grocery stores in eight southeast states.

Root, who started his career with the company as a bag boy, has run the Fruitville Sarasota store since it opened in 1998. When he shows off the finer points of the renovated store to visitors, he sounds like a proud parent of numerous children he loves equally. The makeover took about year, and the store reopened in late June.

One of the more subtle changes, says Root, is the fact that there are no straight lines in the produce section. That presents more of a meandering shopping experience, he says. Another change, more in-the-face, is the flower area has been moved to the front of the store. Says Root: “Nothing says freshness like flowers.”

Video: Amanda Heisey