GSDP works to leverage numbers of growing college town economy
STARKVILLE, Miss. (WCBI) – When it comes to the local business scene in any city, there is strength in numbers.
The Greater Starkville Development Partnership is working to leverage those numbers to grow the economy of “Mississippi’s College Town”.
The GSDP is steadily adding to those numbers, too. In the past 24 months, it has welcomed 10 new retailers and 11 new restaurants.
The partnership is focused on the future of local businesses and helping them thrive in a competitive marketplace, but some area residents are interested in attracting larger national names.
GSDP President Mike Tagert said that it will take more growth on a couple of fronts.
“While our community is definitely growing, we’ve seen dramatic increases in median household income; our population is growing here in Starkville and Oktibbeha County. We’re still, you know, as far as some of those larger brands, we still struggle sometimes to meet the basic metrics. Some of those big box stores require hundreds of thousands of people in population. They require a certain kind of median household income that is far above where we are, so that makes it hard sometimes to recruit those. But what we can do, and we continually, you know, on retail and restaurant recruitment. We’re continually trying to make sure that entrepreneurs have an opportunity in our community to be successful,” said Tagert.
Tagert also pointed out that Starkville is the 8th most visited city in Mississippi.
