PriceSmart has received National Environmental and Planning Agency (NEPA) approval for two major projects — construction of a commercial complex and a food processing facility.

This was revealed in NEPA’s recent board decisions for February and March 2025.

PriceSmart Jamaica Limited was approved for an environmental permit to construct a food processing facility at 1 East Ashenheim Road, St Andrew, on March 18, while Pricesmart Realty Jamaica Limited was approved for an environmental permit and planning permission for the construction of a commercial development in Ironshore, St James, at NEPA’s February 18 meeting.

Pricesmart Realty Jamaica Limited is PriceSmart Inc’s Jamaican subsidiary that owns real estate for its different developments. When the Jamaica Observer reached out to PriceSmart Inc for a comment on the approvals, the multinational company stated, “Unfortunately, we are not providing information on the questions you have asked at this time.”

PriceSmart signed a 20-year lease agreement with Kingston Wharves Limited (KW) in July 2023 to expand its logistics partnership with KW at Ashenheim Road. PriceSmart Jamaica was set to have access to phase one of KW’s integrated modular logistics complex at the end of 2023 to complete the build out of its space. No new announcements have been made regarding this new leased space beyond the NEPA application.

PriceSmart clubs across Latin America and the Caribbean export products to different markets under the company’s private member label “Member’s Selection”.

PriceSmart currently operates two locations in Jamaica — Red Hills Road, St Andrew and Braeton Parkway, Portmore, St Catherine — which were opened in March 2003 and April 2022, respectively.

The Jamaican realty company had previously been approved by NEPA in February 2020 to construct a commercial complex of 5,000 square metres at lot 1101D Catherine Hall, St James. However, that was one month before the COVID-19 pandemic which totally disrupted the world. PriceSmart Inc never provided an update on the situation surrounding this property

PriceSmart previously received NEPA approval for an environmental permit in April 2019 to construct its Portmore location. In September 2019, PriceSmart Inc revealed that it had secured 218,000 square feet of land in September 2019 to construct the company’s Portmore location which was originally set to be open in the fall of 2020. However, that timeline changed due to the pandemic, with the company updating the market in December 2020 that it planned to proceed with the construction of the Portmore location which it expected to be completed by spring of 2022.

Currently, PriceSmart Jamaica operates two full warehouse stores and a bakery store at Bogue City Centre, Montego Bay. The opening of a third location would complement the company’s continued growth across the region, which has seen the recent announcement of several new club openings in certain markets. PriceSmart Realty Jamaica’s NEPA application is currently awaiting a reply from the Ministry of Health related to its planning permission approval for the Sugar Mill Road property in Ironshore.

Since completing the company’s 50th location at Portmore in April 2022, it has opened four new locations across the region — two in El Salvador, one in Colombia and another in Guatemala. It is now seeking to open two new locations this year in Cartago, Costa Rica, and Quetzaltenango, Guatemala which would push its store count to 56 clubs.

Although PriceSmart Inc doesn’t disaggregate the earnings for its individual markets except for Colombia, Jamaica has been lauded as one of the company’s better performing markets. The Red Hills Road location brought in a record US$1.6 million ($228.75 million) in bakery sales for December 2019. The company also noted that its Jamaican operations saw a 12.2 per cent rise in net merchandise sales for the 2024 financial year which ended on August 31. PriceSmart last mentioned Jamaica’s net merchandise sales growing by double digits in 2020 and 2019 when it only had one location.

PriceSmart’s Caribbean operations segment reported a seven per cent uplift in revenue to US$1.35 billion for 2024. The segment saw a 14 per cent rise in net profit to US$77.98 million with PriceSmart spending US$38.78 million on capital expenditure during the period. The Caribbean segment had US$451.27 million in total assets with US$224.02 million defined as long-lived assets and US$10.02 million as goodwill.

PriceSmart Inc is set to publish its second quarter earnings on April 9 after market hours. It will then have its earnings call on April 10 at 10:00 am Jamaica time. The Nasdaq listed company increased its annual dividend from US$1.16 to US$1.26 on February 7 with the first US$0.63 payment made on February 28 and second dividend to be paid on August 29. That dividend translates to US$38.67 million.

It was also announced a few weeks ago that PriceSmart founder and chairman Robert Price would step down as interim chief executive officer on August 31 with his son David Price, PriceSmart’s chief transformation officer, to become CEO on September 1. Robert Price had acted as interim CEO of PriceSmart since Sherry S Bahrambeygui resigned as CEO in February 2023.