If you become a manager, Publix owns you. Your life revolves around their needs (as with any retail manager). They will send you out of town to help with grand openings with almost no notice, when they have known about it for weeks or months. They will also cancel or make you reschedule your vacations if something comes up (like a grand opening). Schedule is rough. 11 hour days at least, closing and then opening, coming in at midnight or 3am, whenever the store needs you to work, that's when you work. 401k match is weak, but that's because they give you so much stock for working there. Dental plan sucks! I could never find a dentist who even accepted it. There are some incompetent managers that are not dealt with. Senior management just waits forever for these managers to screw up so they can get rid of them. This takes up valuable managerial positions and keeps a lot of qualified people from getting their shot. Deal with it directly. Pay below department manager is not that great. I was working 55-65 hours a week and making $44k a year. When you break that down hourly, it is not really worth it. But if you stick it out until you reach that next level, you are set for life.