, FL. Sliced beef sirloin, chicken parmesan and family-size pulled chicken displayed in an open deli case at Sprouts Farmers Market were all measured between 43 and 44 degrees Fahrenheit when a state inspector arrived on September 23, according to Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services records. That same cold-holding violation had been cited at the store before.
The September inspection turned up 10 total violations, including one priority violation and two marked as repeats.
What Inspectors Found in the Deli and Beyond
The deli case violation is the most direct concern for shoppers. The inspector documented internal temperatures of the beef sirloin, chicken parmesan and pulled chicken using a calibrated thermometer, and all three products ranged between 43 and 44 degrees, above the 41-degree maximum required for cold-held ready-to-eat foods. The person in charge moved the items to proper refrigeration during the inspection.
That fix happened on site. But the violation itself was not new.
In the meat department, a shopping cart and a metal food cart were found blocking the handwashing sink, making it inaccessible to employees. The person in charge removed both carts during the inspection. State food safety rules require handwashing sinks to be accessible at all times, precisely because blocked sinks lead to employees skipping hand-washing during food handling.
The inspector also noted that the person in charge could not demonstrate in a verifiable way that food employees had been told to report illnesses or symptoms tied to foodborne illness. That finding was not corrected on site.
In the backroom, cases of pretzels were stored directly on the floor rather than at least six inches above it. Several metal storage shelves in the frozen food walk-in freezer were also not elevated six inches off the floor as required. Ice had built up in the condenser units and on the floor of the same walk-in freezer, a sign of a plumbing or mechanical issue that had not been addressed.
Raw wooden shelves in the backroom were being used to store bottled and canned beverages. Raw wood is a porous surface that cannot be properly sanitized and is not approved for food-contact or food-adjacent storage. Dried food particles and grease had accumulated on the underside of prep tables and on a can opener in the processing area. And a gap under the receiving door left the backroom open to insects and rodents from outside.
In the bakery, a bulk bin of crystal sugar on a prep table had no label. That violation was also marked as a repeat. The person in charge labeled it during the inspection.
What These Violations Mean
The cold-holding failure in the deli case is the violation with the most direct food safety consequence for shoppers. Cooked and sliced meats like beef sirloin and pulled chicken are ready-to-eat, meaning they go directly from the case to a customer's plate with no additional cooking step to kill bacteria. When those products sit above 41 degrees, bacteria including Listeria and Salmonella can multiply. At 43 to 44 degrees, the temperature gap may seem small, but it is enough to accelerate bacterial growth over hours in a display case.
The illness-reporting violation is a different kind of risk. If employees are not formally trained and required in a verifiable way to report symptoms like diarrhea, vomiting or jaundice before handling food, a sick employee can transmit illness directly to products without any visible sign of contamination. The inspector found no verifiable system in place at this Sprouts location.
The blocked handwashing sink in the meat department compounds that concern. Meat department employees handle raw product and need immediate, unobstructed access to a sink. A cart parked in front of the sink creates a practical barrier that discourages or prevents hand-washing between tasks.
The gap under the receiving door is an ongoing vulnerability. Insects and rodents entering through an unsealed exterior opening can contaminate food storage areas, and this violation was not marked as corrected on site.
The Longer Record
The September 23 inspection is the fourth on record for this Sprouts location in state FDACS files. The two most recent prior visits, on September 8 and July 8 of 2026, were focused inspections that turned up zero violations. Those focused inspections are typically narrower in scope than a full sanitation review.
The previous full sanitation inspection, also dated September 23 in the records, documented three violations including one repeat. The cold-holding violation and the unlabeled bulk bin both carry the repeat designation in this inspection, meaning inspectors had flagged the same problems at this location before.
Two violations were corrected on site during this inspection: the deli temperatures and the blocked handwashing sink. Six others, including the gap under the receiving door, the raw wooden shelves, the ice buildup in the freezer, the grease accumulation on prep surfaces, the unsecured shelving in the walk-in, and the pretzels on the floor, were not corrected during the visit. The illness-reporting deficiency, a priority foundation violation, was also left unresolved when the inspector left.
