New Publix vice president of real estate strategy started as part-time cashier

LAKELAND – Bridgid O’Connor has been named the next vice president of real estate strategy at Publix Super Markets Inc. as grocery store-anchored shopping centers have become the gold standard.

O'Connor will take over the role when Bob Balcerak, who currently holds the position, retires, a company news release said.

“For the past 18 years, Bridgid has pursued her passion of strategic planning and real estate development by honing her skills and achieving her goal to learn every aspect of the business,” Publix President Kevin Murphy said in the release.  

O’Connor, 40, began her Publix career in 1998 as a part-time cashier in Dunedin, according to Publix. She worked customer service roles at various store locations before she transferred in 2005 to the company’s real estate department for a role in administrative support.

Within nine months, she was promoted to property specialist. From 2007 to 2009, O’Connor worked as a real estate specialist and rose to a real estate manager position in 2011. Six years later, she was named to her current role as director of real estate strategy.

Balcerak, a 29-year veteran of the company, has announced his decision to retire on March 31, the release said.  

Balcerak, 61, began his Publix career in 1993 as a meat cutter in Orlando. After working in various positions within that department, in 1996 he was promoted to meat manager and in 1999 to assistant store manager.  

In 2000, he was named real estate manager, the release said. In 2011, he was selected as director of real estate strategy and in 2017 promoted to his current role. 

“We are grateful for Bob’s leadership in new store growth, new market and site acquisition strategies,” Murphy said. “He has perpetuated our Publix culture of promotion from within and preparing for opportunity each time his team has secured a new store site."

Balcerak and his wife, Karen, will remain in Central Florida. They are looking forward to spending quality time with family, including their first grandchild, the company said. 

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Grocery Store Boom 

O’Connor’s promotion within the real estate division comes at a time of ongoing expansion across the company’s seven-state operation.    

Angeli Gianchandani, a practitioner in residence at University of New Haven’s Pompea College of Business, said the growth of grocery store-anchored shopping centers accelerated during the pandemic.  

“Grocery shopping is an essential,” Gianchandani said. “That in itself is an essential. People will always need bread, milk and fruit.”

Commercial real estate owners leasing space understand the need for people to shop for food on a regular basis and that factors into their decisions about who they want as tenants in the plaza.

“There is always going to be store traffic,” she said of the motivations for plaza owners leasing to grocers. “This is less vulnerability” for the owners.

At Colliers International in Orlando, David Gabbai, executive managing director in Central Florida, said, “People go to the grocery store several times a week, that means more traffic and thus attracts more tenants at higher rents.” 

Since the pandemic, grocery stores have realized a 20% to 30% increase in traffic, he said. “Liquor store sales are up 50% during pandemic.”

The pandemic is not the only factor, Gabbai said. “With a huge influx of people moving to Florida, in excess of 1,000 a day, the grocery world of retail is among the hottest segments out there,” he said.

Publix Expansion 

The 2021 U.S. grocery market was valued at $750 billion (about $2,300 per person in the U.S.). 

Publix now has 1,297 stores in the Southeast, including 833 stores in Florida, according to its website. Other stores are in Alabama (82 stores), Georgia (196 stores), North Carolina (51 stores), South Carolina (64 stores), Tennessee (52 stores) and Virginia (19 stores). 

In February 2020, the Lakeland-based supermarket chain broke ground on a 940,000-square-foot refrigerated warehouse in Greensboro, N.C. for the project’s first phase. The grocer announced in October 2020 that a 1.2 million-square-foot grocery warehouse would be added to the distribution center, according to a Supermarket News report. 

The new facility, which is slated to open later this year, will be Publix’s 10th distribution center overall and its first in North Carolina, the report said. The company said the Greensboro center will provide more efficient delivery of dry and refrigerated groceries to its stores in the Carolinas and Virginia. 

Publix’s website lists nine other distribution centers in Boynton Beach, Deerfield Beach, Jacksonville, Lakeland, Miami, Orlando and Sarasota; Lawrenceville, Georgia; and McCalla, Alabama. 

Its 11 manufacturing facilities are in Lakeland (bakery plant, dairy plant, deli kitchen, fresh foods, printing services). In Georgia, they are located in Atlanta (bakery plant) and Dacula (dairy plant, fresh foods). Others include Deerfield Beach (dairy plant, fresh foods), Jacksonville (fresh foods). 

According to the Publix website, the real estate “strategy team is responsible for developing and implementing Publix's real estate strategy in the markets it serves, identifying new Publix locations and ensuring that existing facilities are remodeled and upgraded in accordance with our premier standards.”