Publix Super Markets, audited.
11 facilities audited1,395 dock doors2,550 trailer spots1 rail-served
We core-sampled 11 of ~10 DCs, Publix self-distributes from 10 primary DCs per its FY2025 10-K, and we audited 11 owned facilities, so the sample covers the entire distribution network.
Network size: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/81061/000008106126000038/ck0000081061-20251227.htm (FY2025 10-K, fiscal year ended 2025-12-27)
Public audit. Not affiliated with Publix Super Markets. Data from satellite imagery + public records.
We audited Publix Super Markets’s yards from satellite.
Click any site for its gate, docks, and drop yards. No badge, no NDA, just what a driver sees.
Publix Super Markets’s stack is connected. The yards never were.
Your TMS runs the road. Your WMS runs the building. The yards are the tier between them, and they were never on the network.
Every truck gets re-keyed, re-queued, and re-found at each step. The lost time lives between the steps, which is why no single tool ever fixed it. The audit below is that gap, measured on your real yards.
A real audited site, played gate→dock→exit on the true yard geometry. Switch sites with the picker.
Publix Grocery Distribution Center McLeansville NC (Greensboro)
Truck queues at the gate. Guard checks paper BOL, runs the plate, types data into a screen, prints a gate pass.
Movement durations are honest floors set by yard geometry; the uplift lands on the wait fields (queue + dispatch + secondary checkpoints). “Today” timings reflect the radios-and-clipboards world; “With YardFlow” reflects the protocol acting end-to-end. We may be wrong about parts of this, your actual numbers will tell us where.
What the handoffs cost across your network, and what removing them is worth
Read from satellite + Street View across all 11 facilities. At a comparable network, Primo Brands cut drop-and-hook turns from ~48 to ~24 min. Set your real volumes and margins in the calculator to put a number on it.
What surprised us reading Publix Super Markets’s network
Three patterns held across the sites we sampled. None of them show up on a facility list. All of them change how the yard runs.
- 01
All 11 Publix DCs sit behind a controlled truck gate, 7 with a staffed guard booth. No retailer we have mapped gates its yards more tightly.
- 02
Three of the 11 DCs cluster at the Lakeland headquarters complex (grocery, frozen, produce), the dense core of a Florida-anchored network.
- 03
The 11 DCs hold 1,395 dock doors and 2,550 trailer spots, and only one touches rail, so nearly all of it moves by truck.
Turn what you saw into a number for finance
This audit is the evidence. The model is the math. Open the calculator seeded with Publix Super Markets’s audited yards, set your real volumes and margins, and it sizes the opportunity to the dollar.
This deep-dive is the evidence behind the /for/publix memo.
Are these your yards?
Tell us where we got it wrong, or see what 15 minutes of orchestration looks like on your worst site.
We are not asking for a pilot. We are asking for a conversation.
A 30-minute call, direct with Casey. We show you what we found across your yards, you tell us straight where it fits and where it does not. If the call goes well, we talk pilot. If not, you keep the analysis.
None of these times work? Email me at casey@freightroll.com or call or text me at 410-236-7434, and we’ll find one.
Casey Larkin, YardFlow. Jake, our founder, joins when it helps.
