COUNTY tRENDS
Economic overview JOE KECK: Get your ducks in a row and pull on the bootstraps Southwest Colorado Small Business Development Center
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n the last year, the overall economic conditions in La Plata County seem to be improving. Economic vitality in the county seems to be different depending upon the business sector you are in. Construction and real estate seem to be slowly improving. Oil and gas drilling appears to have dropped off considerably over the past few years. Some sectors appear to be doing fine, such as niche manufacturing and export businesses. Retail sales have seen a steady increase this year in Durango, which indicates that consumers are spending more. At the SBDC, we have seen quite an uptick in client requests, especially in the past six months. Our “Starting Your Business� workshops have been running consistently and attracting 15 to 20 people on average. My sense is that some of this demand is driven by people having an entrepreneurial idea, and some by people hedging their bets against being laid off. Overall, our local economy does seem to be faring much better than the state and national economy, with lower unemployment rates, and increasing retail sales tax collections. Durango continues to be highly rated as a great place to live. This appears to be driven by a number of quality-of-life amenities, such as the mountains, rivers, climate, college town, and overall diversity – especially for a 22
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lower populated, rural area. One key element of this quality of life is the number of highly educated and skilled people living here. Fort Lewis College is a major contributor to this element of our community. What does the future have in store for us? My sense is that we will continue to see slow but steady improvement in our county economy. Housing and construction will continue to make some improvements as foreclosures work their way through the process. Solid business planning will continue to be extremely important in determining the success of local businesses. Thorough business planning can really take a lot of the risk out of doing a business expansion or start-up. That is where resources such as the La Plata County Economic Development Alliance, Region 9 Economic Development District, the local Chambers of Commerce (Durango, Bayfield, Ignacio) and the SBDC can make a difference. We also have some excellent collaborative relationships between these economic development and business development organizations. The level of collaboration and partnering we do is really a best practice in the state. These partnerships really can make a positive difference for our clients. Overall, I think our economic future looks pretty good. I would
Economic vitality in the county seems to be different depending upon the business sector you are in.
Sunday, July 22, 2012
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Focus on Business
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