I also love Publix. People around here complain that the prices are higher than some other stores, but I stick to store brands and sales and do pretty well.
I once forgot my wallet completely. They let me take my groceries home and come back to pay the next day. That is service!
Okay you reminded me of my neighborhood grocery store (a Safeway FWIW, but I think it's the individual location more than the chain) that I kind of take for granted. The veteran employees are awesome, the younger/newer people are hit and miss. But there are 2 instances the stick in my mind:
1) I was all checked out. I swipe my credit card whose balance I thought I had paid off but apparently not early enough in the day (*razzin fraggin time zones!*) so it hadn't gone through yet

. This I learned after a frantic call to CC company after card gets declined. I don't have enough cash.

This is the first time anything like this has happened to me, and the first time ever that my CC has been rejected. Cue panic attack and me trying not to cry. I HAVE the money, I just can't give it to the nice grocery store employee.

Desperately, I ask him if they can hold my groceries while I go the ~3 blocks home to grab my checkbook? He says sure, they'll put the cart in back since I have dairy and frozen items. I go home, get check, they give me back my groceries, all is right with the world again - and I learn to check my CC balance more often and pay it off much earlier in the day!

2) We have the new plastic-bags-are-evil rule in our city now, so everyone has to bring in their canvas totes unless they want to be charged 5 cents each for a paper bag with no handles (the one real gripe I have about the store - no handles on a
grocery bag? seriously?

). So on the day before last Thanksgiving, I bring 3 bags but I buy a lot of stuff and its heavy stuff and it doesn't all fit in the bags. The bagging lady (an awesome long time employee who knows me by sight if not by name), sees my panicked expression. She says "You just live nearby right?" I say "Yeah but I have to walk and it's so heavy I'm worried how to even make it a few blocks." She tells me to just take the cart and I can bring it back tomorrow.

Not only do I bring it back but I pick up a few more items - as I'm walking out I see her and make a joke about how her letting me take the cart home paid off, showing her how
this time around my purchases all fit in my bags and can be carried.
Other gold stars for this particular store include their finding and holding my dad's wallet when he dropped it there and being very friendly about it when he called and when he sheepishly went to retrieve it, and this one girl who knows me, my dad and my brothers and always catches up with us when we go through her check stand - she remembers how I like my bags packed, so I will actually wait in a longer line just to go through her check out!
I don't want to jinx anything but I have to admit I don't know what I would do if they weren't around.
