2026 Sustainability Award Winners

The Winn-Dixie Company, in partnership with Relocalize, has introduced an autonomous ice micro-factory at its Plant City, Florida distribution center, a centralized hub serving customers across the state.

The initiative addresses a challenge many treat as unavoidable. Although water is widely available, producing and transporting packaged ice is surprisingly inefficient. In North America, trucks move about 22 billion pounds of ice every year, creating a significant cost and environmental impact.

The Winn-Dixie Company is reimagining how a grocery retailer sources one of its most basic products by partnering with the climate-tech company to manufacture the grocer's SE Grocers Party Cubes ice locally and on demand. The fully autonomous, robotics-run production facility reduces the long-haul trucking, warehousing and cold storage traditionally required to distribute ice across Winn-Dixie's footprint.

The results are measurable. By manufacturing ice at the point of distribution rather than shipping it from distant production facilities, Winn-Dixie can reduce transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions tied to ice delivery by up to 97 percent. At full capacity, the Plant City micro-factory is projected to avoid about 16,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions annually, equivalent to the carbon absorbed by more than 260,000 trees a year.

The on-demand model also reduces water waste during production, while the packaging is certified plastic-negative, helping remove more plastic from the environment than it uses.

The innovation also is designed to scale. Since launching in April 2026, the program has expanded to 12 Winn-Dixie stores in Florida, with more locations planned. Because the micro-factory model is modular and adaptable, it offers flexibility to support future growth and extend its environmental impact over time.

Winn-Dixie's partnership with Relocalize demonstrates that sustainability and operational efficiency can go hand in hand. By producing ice locally, Winn-Dixie reduces unnecessary transportation emissions and water waste while delivering a fresher, high-quality product to neighbors.

As a visible green innovation customers can experience firsthand, the model offers a scalable blueprint for Winn-Dixie's continued work to build a more sustainable supply chain.