Indiana Earns 'B-Plus' For Small Business Friendliness

The full results for Indiana can be found by clicking here.

June 4, 2012

News Release

SAN FRANCISCO, Cal. - Today Thumbtack.com, in partnership with the Kauffman Foundation, has released new data showing that Indianapolis small businesses grade the city quite favorably, giving it a B+ overall and an A+ for its licensing requirements and regulations. However, the city was given an 'F' for its networking programs.

There are a lot of “business climate rankings”, but there aren’t any that draw upon considerable data from small business owners themselves. The Thumbtack.com Small Business Survey is the only survey to draw data from an extensive, nationwide universe of job creators and entrepreneurs themselves in order to investigate the best places in the country to do business.

“After a two-month survey of over 6,000 small business owners nationwide, we found that, like many cities across the country, Indianapolis has certainly had its fair share of challenges,” said Sander Daniels, co-founder of Thumbtack.com. “However, Indianapolis differentiates itself by providing a regulatory environment in which entrepreneurs feel they can easily start a new business.”

Some of the key findings for Indianapolis - and Indiana generally - include:
• Indianapolis earned an A+ for the friendliness of its environmental regulations towards small businesses.
• Metro Indianapolis ranks as Indiana's best region to start a business.
• Here's how Indiana's regions ranked, from easiest to most difficult for starting a small business: 1. Metro Indianapolis, 2. Northern Indiana, and 3. Central/Southern Indiana.
• Surprisingly, women-owned small businesses in Indiana felt much more comfortable economically than did their male counterparts. Female entrepreneurs were 14% more likely than male entrepreneurs to rate their company's current financial situation as "good" or "very good".
• Small businesses run by liberals seem to be doing significantly better than small businesses run by conservatives. Liberal entrepreneurs in Indiana were 43% more likely than the state's conservative entrepreneurs to rate their business's financial situation as "good" or "very good".
The full survey results can be seen here and include full sets of rankings, dozens of easily searchable quotes from Indianapolis small businesses, regional comparisons within states, and Census data comparing Indianapolis's key demographics against those of other cities.

"Indiana has been easy to deal with in terms of getting my business started. They've been great about not creating any issues with licenses or taxes. "
- DJ, Indianapolis

Survey methodology

Thumbtack.com surveyed 6,022 small businesses across the United States. The survey asked questions about the friendliness of states towards small business and about small business finances, such as:

• "In general, how would you rate your state's support of small business owners?"
• "Would you discourage or encourage someone from starting a new business in your state?" and
• "How would you rate your company's financial situation today?"

Thumbtack.com and Kauffman ranked states and cities against one another along 15 metrics.

What is Thumbtack.com?
Thumbtack.com is a place where you can hire help locally. Need a DJ, carpenter, boot camp instructor, or hot dog truck caterer? Tell us what you need, and we’ll bring you 3-5 bids on that job to your email inbox within 24 hours. More than 275,000 small businesses and freelancers have listed their services on Thumbtack nationwide.

Source: Thumbtack.com