Business View Caribbean | November 2020

65 BUSINESS VIEW CARIBBEAN NOVEMBER 2020 JAMA I CA PLUMB ING SUPPL I ES L IMI TED premier plumbing supplies outlets. The Molynes Road location features a spacious showroom, ample parking space, an air-conditioned sales area and efficient delivery area. In November 2016, the company opened a branch in Portmore Sovereign Village – a newly built shopping mall to better serve customers in Portmore. But it soon became clear that storage space was limited for this growing business, so plans were made to relocate. Fast forward to January 2020. Jamaica Plumbing Supplies opened its newest and largest location. The branch in Portmore Sovereign Village closed its doors and operations were moved to a beautiful and spacious standalone building in Naggo Head, Portmore. The staff complement has increased to 33 members, overall, at its two current locations. Winston Neil describes the reasons behind his creating Jamaica Plumbing Supplies. He recalls, “At the age of 16, I left school and went straight into learning plumbing and continued until age 18 plus, working for my brother. I discovered when I went out on my own, and even when I was a Supervisor in my brother’s business, that one of the biggest obstacles was obtaining materials to do our daily chores. So after working for a couple years on my own in an unregistered company, I decided to approach one of my big customers and tell them I would like to open a business and ask them to credit me some materials. Their first question was, “how are you going to pay it back?” Because I didn’t have a business plan. I said, “When I sell it.” So they gave me three faucets, and each time I paid them back for one, they gave me two more. And that’s how I continued to expand. At this time I did not have a business space or a business office – I was basically operating out of home.” Over time, more business was coming in and the supply side of the business was growing – to the point where, four or five years later, the company was employing 20 people and had two