No MO: Kansas City, St. Louis drop off Inc list of ‘50 Best Cities for Starting a Business’

Shots fired. A new ranking by Inc. magazine claims startup powerhouse Austin, Texas, is “leading the nation in job creation and high-growth company density — and delish BBQ.”

Kansas City? Not even on the list.

Inc.’s Surge Cities index — detailing what founders can learn from the 50 Best U.S. Cities for Starting a Business in 2020 — totally omitted KC from its latest ranking after putting the City of Fountains at No. 40 in 2019.

St. Louis (ranked No. 33 in 2019) also dropped from the index.

Austin, Texas

The report considered such elements as job creation, population growth, net business creation, rate of entrepreneurship, wage growth, high-growth company density, and early-stage fundraising deals — all areas where Austin excelled, editors said. (The Texas capital city also ranked No. 1 in 2019.)

“Austin is one of the few markets that is able to support a full range of kinds of startups — like Silicon Valley or New York,” said Joshua Baer, the founder of Capital Factory, the city’s dominant startup incubator, in the Inc. report. “It’s because we have a diverse set of strengths in our background.”

In contrast, Kansas City’s business ecosystem is dominated by the health care industry, which accounts four of its top five private sector employers, according to Inc.

Other peer cities on the list: Boise (No. 5); Nashville (No. 11); Oklahoma City (No. 39); Minneapolis (No. 40); Columbus (No. 44); Tulsa (No. 47); Des Moines (No. 48); and Indianapolis (No. 50).

Click here for the full list of Inc.’s 50 Best U.S. Cities for Starting a Business in 2020.