Being the 18th-most populous state of the Union, Missouri has over 6 million residents who mostly live around Kansas City, St. Louis, Springfield and Columbia. The state’s capital is Jefferson City, which surprisingly is only the fifteenth most populous city in Missouri.

Nicknamed Show Me State or Cave State, Missouri has a gross state product at $299.1 billion in 2016, ranking 22nd among U.S. states. The most prominent industries in the state include aerospace, light manufacturing, financial services, transportation equipment, printing/publishing, food processing, electrical equipment and beer. Fields that are constantly growing in Missouri are biotechnology, science and agricultural technology.

When it comes to unemployment, the state had a rate of 3.9% in 2017. In the same year, Missouri ranked as the 5th-best corporate tax index, and the 15th-best overall tax climate. These aspects are highly important aspects for entrepreneurs and small business owners.

 

What Doing Business in Missouri Means

·        5^th in Lowest Corporate Tax

·        11^th in Ease of Doing Business

·        11^th in Entrepreneurship

 

Missouri is, in fact, a terrific place to start a business.  But before we find out which steps are required prior to being proud owners, let’s see which are some of the best places to start an enterprise in.

 

Best Places to Start a Business in Missouri

Besides the bigger cities, there are a few places that are worth considering when you’re thinking about starting a business. Here are the top three:

1. Brentwood

Hmm, Brentwood? I bet you’re wondering why… Well, although being the smallest city in the top 10 by population, Brentwood is an ideal place to start a business. The city’s daytime population increases from the usual 8,000 to nearly triple. After being analyzed, researchers acknowledged that Brentwood actually has the third-highest percentage of businesses with paid employees.

Number of businesses per 100 people: 18.65

Average revenue per business: $1,727,150

Businesses with paid employees: 48.52%

 

2. Creve Coeur

Positioned near St. Louis, Creve Coeur the Monsanto Co.’s world headquarters and also a hub for life-science, technology and bioscience. It also had the second-highest number of businesses per 100 residents in the top 10.

Number of businesses per 100 people: 19.33

Average revenue per business: $5,347,591

Businesses with paid employees: 44.49%

3. Clayton

After being carefully studied, Clayton turned out to have the highest number of businesses per 100 people among the top 10 places. It is actually a St. Louis suburb that has 16,000 residents and is the home to Fontbonne University, Concordia Seminary and Washington University in St. Louis West Campus. Clayton is also the headquarters of several corporations.

Number of businesses per 100 people: 21.58

Average revenue per business: $3,006,574

Businesses with paid employees: 44.22%

 

Steps to Starting a Business in Missouri

1. Pick the right idea

Although you might have had a business dream since you were a kid or someone gives you a few options that could work for you, the most important aspect before starting a business in doing a lot of market research. Finding a market need and filling it is most of the time the best way to go.

If you are lucky enough to be able to combine your dreams and skills with a market need then you should really celebrate because that is quite a rare thing.

A few great business ideas to start in the state of Missouri include

·         Clothing Boutique

·         Coffee Roasting Business

·         Flea Market

·         Air Duct Cleaning Business

·         Pumpkin Farm

 

2. Choose a great name

Pick your friends and family’s minds, do a lot of research, read plenty of things regarding the future industry of your business, but don’t rush when it comes to your company’s name. The name itself can have a tremendous impact on your success and development. It should be catchy, easy to remember and even amusing. People tend to associate funny things easier and they usually stick.

 

3. Plan your business

Creating a business plan is the most important step you can take towards becoming an owner. The plan should be a great guide in a process that can become pretty hard at times. It’s highly important that you stay organized and focused on every little step.

Your business plan you should include the following:

·         Executive Summary

·         Company Description

·         Products and/or Services

·         Market analysis

·         Strategy and Implementation

·         Organization and Management Team

·         Financial Plan and Projections

·         Appendix

 

4. Pick a Business Structure

The most common business structures in the United States are

·         LLCs

·         Corporations

·         Partnerships

·         Sole Proprietorships

 

5. Create a business Bank Account

Separating your personal funds from your business’s income is highly important. You will be able to keep things more organized knowing exactly how much money you’ve earned each month. You will most likely need an accountant, and by having a separate business bank account it will be easier to keep track of everything.

 

6. Hire the right team

Obtaining an EIN, business permits and licenses are usually considered dreaded tasks. That’s why hiring the right professionals will make your job much easier. However, if you’re on a tight budget, you can do plenty of research and still simplify the process by having all the information at hand.

 

7. Financing your future business

Putting the funds together to form a business can be quite challenging especially if you don’t have any substantial personal savings or don’t have wealthy friends and family willing to invest in your idea. But that’s no reason to feel discouraged. There have never been as many options as today.

Besides bank loans, lines of credit and business grants that can be a little difficult to obtain, there are some methods that could suit your future business perfectly:

Angel investors – are usually wealthy individuals who are interested in investing consistent capital in a great business idea, in exchange for convertible debt or ownership equity. You can find out more information by researching a few angel groups or angel networks.

 

Crowdfunding – it has gained a lot of popularity in the last 5 years. There are a lot of crowdfunding platforms where individuals can create campaigns either for businesses or different creative ideas and people all over the world can invest different sums of money. According to a worldwide estimate in 2015 over US$34 billion was raised by crowdfunding.

Some of the most popular platforms are Kickstarter, Indiegogo, Crowdfunder, RocketHub, Crowdrise and many more. For more information about how to create a crowdfunding campaign check out our recent article: http://successfulownership.com/posts/how-to-create-a-crowdfunding-campaign