Active Home Centre expands to Montego Bay
Published:Friday | February 4, 2022 | 12:09 AMKarena Bennett - Business Reporter
Active Home Centre, a retailer of construction finishing materials and furniture, has opened a second retail store in Montego Bay.
The expansion into another city comes nine years after Active Home Centre opened its flagship store at Constant Spring Road in Kingston.
At 12,000 square feet, Active Home Centre Montego Bay is a much smaller version of the flagship store, which spans 90,000 square feet.
It gives the retailer easier access to the hotel market on the north coast and within reach of homeowners, corporate clients, designers and contractors undertaking construction or renovating works at the western end of the island.
Active Home Centre officially opened the doors to its second retail store on Tuesday, February 1, but the cost associated with the expansion was not disclosed.
“Throughout the years, there has been a growing demand for home finishes in Montego Bay and the surrounding communities, so we made the decision to bring the store closer to customers on that side of the island,” Active Home said in an emailed response to questions from the Financial Gleaner.
A subsidiary of Active Traders, Active Home Centre was formed in 2013 as a retail supplier of tiles, bathrooms fixtures and cabinets, windows, doors, fans, and lighting fixtures.
Active Traders started its business as a wholesale distributor of wood windows and doors, selling directly to hardware stores in 1995 from Skibo Avenue in Kingston.
But as the demand for tiles grew in Jamaica, so did the company’s business model.
By 1997, Active Traders had restructured its business and began retailing its products to consumers at the Marketplace complex, formerly known as the Challenge Centre. It then diversified into ceramic and porcelain tiles and related products, including grout and sealants, as well as bathroom fixtures.
The company also owns a 60,000-square-foot property at Dunrobin in Kingston, which was reconfigured and is currently used for warehousing after Active Home established its flagship store on Constant Spring Road.
Over the years, Active Home Centre has become known as a supplier of granite stones and porcelain tiles, a reputation it intends to exploit and leverage into sales in the Montego Bay market.
Hoteliers are one of its primary targets. Despite the devastating impact on the tourism market by the pandemic, construction activity within the hotel sector has been steady. That, as the Planning Institute of Jamaica has theorised, was due to positioning by investors wanting to be ready for business as the economy recovers.
Some 7,500 rooms were projected to be added to the stock from 2021 to 2023, the majority of which is slated for the western end of Jamaica.
Active Home Centre employs 200 workers in Kingston, and is looking to staff the Montego Bay store with 20 persons from surrounding communities.
Active Home Centre Montego Bay features a two-floor showroom, warehouse, back offices, and reception area. The first level will showcase tiles, windows and doors, while the second level will feature bathrooms, fans and lighting fixtures.