What Cantonment's Grocery Run Looks Like Until the Highway 29 Aldi Opens

Last March, the greeting cards at the Cantonment Winn-Dixie were marked down 98%. NorthEscambia.com visited on a Wednesday in mid-March and found most items around 40% off. A "This store is closing soon" banner hung out front, and most of the floor was already roped off and empty.

Eight months later the building at 1550 South Highway 29 is still a grocery store in waiting. On November 2, Aldi regional vice president Heather Moore told NorthEscambia.com, "We're excited to share our first Cantonment store is on track to open by the end of the year."

That leaves a few weeks of the in-between routine. Since spring, a full grocery trip from this part of Highway 29 has mostly meant heading south toward Nine Mile Road. When the Aldi opens, a full-size store comes back to the corridor, and it runs on a different set of habits than the Winn-Dixie it replaces.

Where the weekly shop has been going since March

The store that closed was the full-size supermarket on this stretch of Highway 29. With it gone, the closest options split into one local stop on Highway 29 and a cluster of bigger stores along Nine Mile Road.

Grocery Advantage is the one on this list that stays on North Highway 29. The others are on Nine Mile Road, and for anyone who lived near the old Winn-Dixie, that means a longer drive and a different set of traffic lights. NorthEscambia.com puts the Nine Mile Aldi under five miles from the Cantonment store.

Some households have a farm option too. Aliff Acres, a small farm on Purdue Road in McDavid, runs a CSA with pickup at the farm, and a Molino-area drop-off is one of its distribution options. Its 2026 listing includes produce, eggs and pork.

Why the sign out front is changing

The Cantonment closing is one piece of a much larger swap. Aldi announced an agreement to acquire Winn-Dixie and Harveys on August 16, 2023. At the time it said it would evaluate which locations to convert and keep the rest under their existing names.

According to NorthEscambia.com's January report on the closing, Aldi completed the purchase of Southeastern Grocers in 2024. A group of private investors later bought Southeastern Grocers and its Winn-Dixie and Harveys brands back from Aldi. Aldi kept its plan to convert its remaining 220 Winn-Dixie and Harveys locations to the Aldi format by 2027, and the Cantonment store was on that list.

In Escambia County, that plan has turned into a steady run of grand openings. By mid-March 2026, the county's fourth Aldi had just opened on Ninth Avenue in a converted Winn-Dixie. A fifth was coming to South Blue Angel Parkway, and the Cantonment and Bayou Boulevard conversions were scheduled for later in the year. As of November 2, NorthEscambia.com counts six other Aldi locations operating in Escambia County. Cantonment is near the end of that line.

Nine Mile Road already ran this playbook

The best preview of the Cantonment conversion sits a few miles south. The Winn-Dixie at 312 East Nine Mile Road closed in September 2024 and reopened as an Aldi in March 2025.

From closing to opening day took about six months. The new store took over 20,000 square feet of the old building and opened on March 3, 2025, with 15 employees, four of whom had worked at the Winn-Dixie.

Cantonment's version is taking longer. The store closed in March, and as of early November Aldi was still describing the opening as end of year. For staff, Southeastern Grocers said in January that "Associates will have the first opportunity to apply for roles at the new Aldi store or may continue their careers with Winn-Dixie at another location," and that everyone at the location received advance notice.

At the Nine Mile grand opening, Moore explained how the company thinks about new customers in a conversation NorthEscambia.com republished in March:

"So, I think what we say a lot of times is the price brings them in the door, and the quality brings them back."

In the same interview she said fresh produce and meat come in every day, and that about 90% of what's on the shelves is Aldi's own private label, backed by a double quality guarantee.

That 90% figure matters more than any other detail for a household used to Winn-Dixie. A shopping list written around particular national brands will need some swaps once the Highway 29 store opens.

What changes at checkout

Winn-Dixie shoppers who have never been inside an Aldi will run into a few habits that come with the format. If you already shop at Nine Mile, you know them. If not, here they are:

1. Bring a quarter. Carts unlock with a quarter, and you get it back when you return the cart. NorthEscambia.com explained that the system means employees don't have to round up carts in the parking lot.
2. Bring bags, and plan to bag your own. Aldi asks shoppers to bring their own bags and pack their own groceries. Reusable and paper bags are for sale at the register, and NorthEscambia.com reported that a large reusable bag costs under a dollar.
3. Watch the ALDI Finds aisle. Aldi describes ALDI Finds as weekly special buys that are only around for a limited time, so what's on that aisle changes from week to week.
4. Expect mostly store brands. With roughly nine in ten products carrying Aldi's own labels, the brand names you used to grab at Winn-Dixie will mostly be different.

The first two are why a lot of Aldi regulars keep a quarter in the cupholder and a stack of bags in the trunk. Once the Cantonment store opens, both start paying off on the Highway 29 trip itself, with no detour to Nine Mile.

The weeks before the doors open

Until the opening is announced, the in-between routine stays the same. Grocery Advantage on North Highway 29 covers the quick trips. For a full cart, the choices are the Nine Mile Aldi, Publix at Nine Mile until 10 p.m., or the Walmart Neighborhood Market on East Nine Mile Road until 11 p.m.

NorthEscambia.com has followed this building from the January closing announcement through the March clearance sale to the November update. It's the outlet to watch for the opening date. After closing in March, 1550 South Highway 29 is on track to sell groceries again by the end of 2026.

A grocery store opening or closing changes the daily drive for a lot of households along Highway 29, and it's the kind of change I follow closely for neighbors in Cantonment. If you'd like to know how corridor changes like this one show up in what your own home is worth, William Maybin is happy to walk you through it. Get your instant home valuation and we can talk it over.