Port St. Lucie finally is getting its Costco store.<\/p>\n
Residents have wanted a Costco store there for years, and the city now is poised to sell Costco Wholesale 22 acres for the project. It would be adjacent to Costco’s distribution depot now under construction in Southern Grove.<\/p>\n
Assuming all goes to plan.<\/p>\n
The first step is for the Governmental Finance Corp. \u2014 a city-created nonprofit, comprised of the City Council members and responsible for financing and managing real estate projects \u2014 to meet March 9 to vote on the land sale.<\/p>\n
Costco is proposing a 170,000-square-foot retail store and gas station for the site.<\/p>\n
City leaders, including Mayor Shannon Martin, have said for months that conversations were taking place with the company to bring a store to Port St. Lucie.<\/p>\n
Costco opened its Stuart store, the first on the Treasure Coast, April 25.<\/p>\n
The Port St. Lucie store would be larger than the 156,438-square-foot Stuart store. While the Stuart store is on a larger parcel, that development eventually is to have restaurants and apartments in addition to the retail store and gas station.<\/p>\n
The first phase of Costco’s distribution depot, already under construction on nearly 200 acres in Southern Grove in Port St. Lucie, is due to open later this month.<\/p>\n
That opening is to coincide with closure of the company’s current depot in West Palm Beach. Costco operates 24 regional distribution depots servicing its more than 800 stores worldwide.<\/p>\n
Phase 1 of the depot is to include a 595,000-square-foot cold and dry storage facility. It is expected to employ 265 people.<\/p>\n
Phase 2 of the depot, which does not yet have an announced opening date, is to include a 1.06-million-square-foot dry-storage facility, and is expected to bring the overall depot to more than 500 employees.<\/p>\n
There is also is land for expansion.<\/p>\n
Costco finally comes to Port St. Lucie<\/p>\n
Costco has a tumultuous history on the Treasure Coast. It took the company roughly 11 years to build its first store in Stuart.<\/p>\n
Costco originally wanted a store in Palm City, but after four failed attempts to pass Martin County’s review process, Costco withdrew its application<\/a>\u00a0in September 2017.<\/p>\n During that brief window of opportunity, Port St. Lucie pitched itself as an alternative site.<\/p>\n Port St. Lucie Mayor Greg Oravec offered to give Costco land in Southern Grove for free.<\/p>\n “(We) would like to welcome you to our incredible city,” Oravec said in a video addressing Costco and uploaded to YouTube. “I think we can work out a deal where you can have a premier site in the Southern Grove portion of Tradition for a purchase price of zero dollars. That’s right. Zero dollars.”<\/p>\n But Costco eventually settled on a site on Kanner Highway in Stuart.<\/p>\n Once the city of Stuart gave its OK in 2021, however, a legal challenge kept the project in limbo until the challenge was withdrawn in 2023 and construction of the new store finally moved forward. <\/p>\n Jack Randall is TCPalm\u2019s economy and real estate reporter. You can reach him at jack.randall@tcpalm.com.<\/p>\n Wicker Perlis is TCPalm’s Watchdog Reporter for St. Lucie County. You can reach him at Wicker.Perlis@TCPalm.com.<\/p>\n