Publix is planning a second Wellen Park location, this one anchoring a new shopping center at the intersection of West Village Parkway and Manasota Beach Road in North Port. The project is expected to open in late 2027 and will sit near the freshly opened Wellen Park High School, giving the fast-growing master-planned community its second grocery-anchored retail hub.
News of the project surfaced via a Facebook post shared by the North Port News and Traffic Report page, according to WhatNow. Per that post, the shopping center will include 10 additional inline units for lease attached to the Publix, each measuring 1,400 square feet — space that could eventually fill with restaurants, salons, or other small retailers looking to plant a flag in one of Florida's hottest residential markets.
The plaza's location is no accident. Sarasota County Schools opened Wellen Park High School on an 81-acre campus adjacent to the shopping center site on August 10, marking the county's first new comprehensive high school in 25 years, with more than 1,000 students enrolled from the start. Pairing a grocery anchor with a new school campus positions Publix directly in the path of daily parent and student traffic in a corridor that's about to get a lot busier.
A Road Extension With a Bumpy Legal History
The new shopping center also sits along Sarasota County's $15 million Manasota Beach Road Extension, a public-private partnership designed to connect Wellen Park directly to Englewood and area beaches. A resident-led legal challenge against the project's environmental permits was dismissed by a state administrative judge in July, clearing the way for the road work to proceed and, eventually, for improved east-west traffic flow past the new plaza.
That timing matters, because commenters on the North Port News and Traffic Report's Facebook post, as relayed by WhatNow, weren't shy about airing frustrations with the existing Publix at the Marketplace at Wellen Park on Mercado Drive. One commenter said the downtown Publix is already overcrowded when snowbirds are in town, while another argued it won't be able to handle traffic once Wellen Park reaches full buildout. A second location, at least on paper, is meant to relieve exactly that kind of pressure.
Wellen Park's Population Boom Is the Real Driver
The scale of that buildout helps explain why grocers keep circling the area. Wellen Park covers roughly 11,000 acres in south Sarasota County and is planned for 22,500 homes and 50,000 to 60,000 residents at full buildout, according to Sarasota Magazine — a dramatic leap from the roughly 10,000 residents living there as of mid-2026. Real estate consulting firm RCLCO reported the community climbed to No. 3 among the nation's top-selling master-planned communities in July, recording 727 new home sales in the first half of 2026, a 37% surge over its mid-2025 pace.
North Port itself has grown just as fast. The city's population topped 100,000 residents in 2026, a growth rate of more than 33% since the 2020 census count of 74,793, per Census Bureau estimates and regional projections cited by Team Renick. That kind of growth curve is exactly what draws national retail chains hunting for territory before competitors lock it down.
Publix Isn't the Only Grocer Betting Big
Publix's move is part of a broader wave of grocery investment stretching across Wellen Park and North Port. Discount grocer Aldi is building a 12,000-square-foot store at Venice Plaza along U.S. 41, right next to the community's existing Costco, as Hoodline reported in its piece on Aldi's arrival at Venice Plaza. Detwiler's Farm Market is also planning what would be its eighth location, a 52,000-square-foot store at Interstate 75 and Sumter Boulevard, per WhatNow — its largest to date, and a project Hoodline covered separately as it moves toward a late-2028 opening.
Benderson Development has also secured site rights for a 52-acre mixed-use retail and dining destination elsewhere in Wellen Park, adding yet another layer to the commercial buildout reshaping the area. Taken together, the projects point to a corner of Sarasota County where grocery options were once thin and are now multiplying almost as fast as the rooftops around them.
Publix's own corporate trajectory reflects why it keeps expanding into growth markets like this one. The chain reported $62.7 billion in retail sales in 2025 and set a 2026 goal of $66 billion, with plans to open 44 new stores this year, roughly half of them in Florida, according to Bay Food Brokerage. The company traces its roots to a single store founded in 1930 and describes itself, per its own website, as the largest employee-owned company in the United States, with a stated commitment to customer service and community involvement.
For now, the West Village Parkway project remains in its planning stages, with a late-2027 target and no confirmed list of tenants for the 10 inline units. But for North Port residents who've watched a single Publix strain under seasonal crowds, the promise of a second store — plus Aldi, Detwiler's, and Costco all competing for grocery carts nearby — suggests the neighborhood's shopping options are about to look very different.
