Aldi Inc. is cleared to convert the Winn-Dixie supermarket in Arlington into its smaller discount grocery format, a year after it bought the Jacksonville-based brand and a month after selling some of the stores back to local ownership.
The city issued a permit March 4 for T.D. Farrell Construction Inc. of Alpharetta, Georgia, to renovate the store at 6060 Fort Caroline Road, Unit 10, at a project cost of $1.451 million.
The shopping center is the Fort Caroline Trading Post east of University Boulevard.
German grocer Aldi bought Jacksonville-based Southeastern Grocers Inc., with about 400 Winn-Dixie and Harveys Supermarkets in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi, as of March 7, 2024.
Less than a year later, a private investment group led by former Southeastern Grocers CEO and President Anthony Hucker announced Feb. 7, 2025, that it bought 170 of those stores as well as the Winn-Dixie liquor store business.
The private investors immediately took over operations of those grocery and liquor stores.
Aldi intends to complete its previously stated conversion plans with a total of about 220 Winn-Dixie and Harveys Supermarket stores, which is expected to conclude in 2027.
The February news release said Southeastern Grocers will continue to operate the remaining stores identified for conversion to Aldi until they are closed for the renovations.
Aldi, with U.S. headquarters in Batavia, Illinois, intends to retrofit the Fort Caroline Road Winn-Dixie into an Aldi, which requires “a significant downsizing of the unit” with the addition of an interior wall.
Aldi will renovate 21,985 square feet of the 47,188-square-foot Winn-Dixie space.
Aldi needs less space than traditional markets because of its streamlined layout and the fact it does not offer services such as pharmacies; bakeries; meat, deli and seafood counter service; floral services; or money orders, for example.
Plans show Aldi will lease 22,919 square feet of the 47,188-square-foot space that Winn-Dixie uses.
That leaves space available to the landlord to re-lease.
Winn-Dixie anchors the roughly 80,000-square-foot shopping center that includes Planet Fitness and Citi Trends. It was built in 1984.
Aldi is converting several other area Winn-Dixie and Harveys locations.
Aldi has about 2,400 U.S. stores and said the Southeastern Grocers acquisition was part of a plan to add 800 stores nationwide by 2028 through new openings and store conversions.
Aldi has at least 13 stores in Northeast Florida, comprising eight in Jacksonville and five in Clay, Nassau and St. Johns counties.