A national lender's survey says the number of Black-owned businesses in Tallahassee beats the national average. Those numbers are spurring local economic developers to look for ways to help even more Black businesses get off the ground.
Leon County ranks among the top 15 in the country when it comes to the percentage of Black-owned businesses in the area. Matt Schulz is the chief credit analyst for Lending Tree, which released the survey.
"We found that 7% of businesses in Tallahassee are Black-owned and that puts Tallahassee tied for 14th among the 50 biggest metros in the country."
The survey found, out of a total of 7,828 businesses in Tallahassee, 549 or 7% of are Black-owned. That number is twice the national average. But Schulz saids the figure falls short of the population indices.
"When you contrast that to the fact that about 32% of the population of the city is Black, there's a lot of room for growth."
Darryl Jones is in charge of supporting minority, women and small business programs with Leon County's Office of Economic Vitality. He said the community has lots of resources to help that growth happen.
"Resource partners like the FAMU Small Business Development Center, DOMI Station, Jim Moran Institute. And then you have lending partners like the FAMU Federal Credit Union and the Smart Steps Loan Program."
Still, Jones said he and others at OEV are happy the local Black business numbers seem headed in the right direction.
