Jamaica Just Got Back the Last 578 Rooms It Lost

Royalton Hotels & Resorts confirmed on September 15 that its entire Jamaican portfolio is open again, with Royalton Blue Waters and Royalton Hideaway Blue Waters welcoming guests in Montego Bay. The pair join Royalton Negril, Royalton Hideaway Negril and Grand Lido Negril, which came back on the island’s west coast in late August. It is the first time since Hurricane Melissa that all five properties have been trading at once, and it closes a recovery arc that the company repeatedly extended rather than rushed. For a group that operates at the volume end of Jamaica’s all-inclusive market, having the full estate dark through a winter season was an expensive way to be careful.

The Blue Waters reopening returns roughly 578 rooms to Jamaica’s inventory and brings about 1,200 employees back to work. That second number is the one the island has been watching most closely. Resort staffing is the transmission belt between tourism demand and household income in Negril and Montego Bay, where a single large property can underwrite an entire neighbourhood’s earnings, and the sector has been counting returning workers as carefully as it counts returning keys. Roughly 80,000 hotel workers across Jamaica had already gone back on payroll before this week’s reopening, against a national plan to restore several thousand more rooms to inventory before the end of the year.

Royalton had originally hoped to be trading again far earlier. The company pushed its reopening dates out more than once, citing structural reviews of guest areas and back-of-house spaces, and saying it would not reopen until working conditions were stable and secure for staff as well as guests. That caution was unusual in a market where operators often race to be first back onto the booking engines and worry about the punch list afterwards. It meant the brand sat out a full winter season in one of the Caribbean’s most competitive destinations, ceding bookings to rivals in Punta Cana, Cancun and Montego Bay properties that had reopened sooner.

For travellers, the practical effect is more supply heading into the winter peak, at a moment when Caribbean room rates have been squeezed by reduced capacity across the region. Jamaica has been steadily returning rooms to inventory through 2026, and the Royalton reopenings are among the larger single tranches to land at once. Anyone who deferred a Negril or Montego Bay trip will now find both the west coast and the north coast bookable again, with properties that have been through a full refurbishment rather than a cosmetic patch-up. Rates for the December and January windows are the place to watch for how quickly the extra supply shows up in pricing.

Sources: Jamaica Gleaner, Travelweek