Local City Among Top 10 for Entrepreneurs

A local North Texas city topped the list of best places for entrepreneurs to start a business.

The City of Fort Worth ranked No.9 on a list of the top 100 places in the United States to start a business, according to a new report from the personal finance company WalletHub.

WalletHub used three key dimensions split along 19 different metrics to determine a city’s overall ranking. The three dimensions included a city’s business environment (50 points), its resource access (25 points), and its overall business costs (25 points).

Each of the nearly 20 metrics used by WalletHub was graded on a 100-point scale, with a score of 100 representing the most favorable conditions for startups, according to the study’s methodology.

Fort Worth received a total score of 58.00, slightly behind Charlotte, North Carolina, which ranked No.8 with a total score of 58.30. In terms of the three categories used for measurement, Fort Worth scored 9th for its business environment, 15th for its access to resources, and 69th for business costs.

The study suggests that while Fort Worth maintains a flourishing business environment with easy resource access, it is held back by elevated business costs.

“Americans are born with an entrepreneurial streak. It’s in our DNA,” WalletHub said in the April 24 report. “From the Gold Rush to the Industrial Revolution to the Internet Age, intense periods of innovation have molded our economy and sparked important societal advancements.”

“That said, the past few years have been some of the toughest ones ever for business owners in the U.S.,” WalletHub suggested, highlighting the negative impacts of the “COVID-19 pandemic, the Great Resignation and high inflation.”

Several other Texas cities that made the top 100 list include No.10 Austin (56.86), No.19 Arlington (54.74), No.20 Dallas (54.11), No.21 Lubbock (54.10), No.26 Irving (53.17), No.29 Laredo (51.78), No.42 Houston (50.21), No.52 Garland (48.36), No.59 Plano (47.20), No.60 El Paso (47.16), and No.61 San Antonio (46.85).

During a recent economic development luncheon in Fort Worth, Gov. Greg Abbott claimed, “Texas’ economy is working for all Texans,” placing special emphasis on the economic growth in Fort Worth, The Dallas Express previously reported.

Fort Worth is a big part of the Texas economic juggernaut, and strategic economic development tools have aided in its success, Abbott said in a news release following the luncheon.

A 2023 list of the top 10 cities in which to start a business can be found below:

1. 1. Orlando, Florida – 65.34
   2. Jacksonville, Florida – 62.25
   3. Miami, Florida – 60.78
   4. Tampa, Florida – 60.37
   5. Durham, North Carolina – 60.15
   6. Boise, Idaho – 59.48
   7. Atlanta, Georgia – 58.79
   8. Charlotte, North Carolina – 58.30
   9. Fort Worth, Texas – 58.00
   10. Austin, Texas – 56.86