MarketWatch:Denver is nation's 6th-best city for business

Denver Business Journal - by Mark Harden | Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Denver is the nation's sixth-best city for business out of 102 major metro areas, MarketWatch declares in its annual ranking.

"[A] perennial top 10 city, Denver continues to attract businesses of all types looking for quality of life," the business-news-and-information website says.

It says Denver "seems to have no trouble attracting new companies," noting the recent decision by kidney-care giant DaVita Inc. (NYSE: DVA) to locate its headquarters here.

MarketWatch, which has compiled its ranking for four years, evaluated 102 large cities, using a variety of measures that break down into two categories: "company score," the concentration of businesses within a metro area, and "economic score," which takes into account unemployment, job growth, population growth, personal income and local gross domestic product.

It said it used more metric categories this year than before, partly to better reflect tourism business and the economic impact of military bases.

Denver's total score is 980, its company score is 599, and its economic score is 381.

Denver's company score is second-highest of the 102 cities, after Minneapolis' 601. That may surprise some locals, since the common wisdom is that the Mile High City is home to fewer large company headquarters than other cities its size.

Nevertheless, "the region is among the top 20 in six of the seven metrics that measure concentration of companies," MarketWatch's Russ Britt writes.

But MarketWatch downgrades Denver on personal income and in change in employment. "Its jobless rate rose half a percentage point" from last year, Britt says.

Denver ranked seventh in MarketWatch's 2009 best-cities-for-business ranking, third in 2008 and second in 2007.

Denver has done well recently in business, economic and career rankings. In November, career search engine Juju.com rated it the ninth-best city for job seekers. In October, the CareerCast.com/JobSerf Index placed Denver ninth as a place to find a managerial position. Businessweek in July called Denver the nation's eighth-best city for college grads to find work. And Forbes in June ranked Denver America's eighth-best city for young professionals.

MarketWatch ranks Colorado Springs No. 54 overall, with a total score of 715, a company score of 312 and an economic score of 403.

The top city is Washington, D.C., with a total score of 1100, a company score of 585 and an economic score of 515.

"Washington has made the most out of having the U.S. government, a very large customer for any company, to keep it chugging during the tough times," Britt writes. "But the region also has seen massive expansion in suburban towns in Virginia and Maryland over the years that has boosted its economy."

Rounding out the top 10 after Washington are Omaha, Neb.; Boston; Des Moines, Iowa; Minneapolis; Denver; Richmond, Va.; New York; Harrisburg, Pa.; and Seattle.

Fresno, Calif. is at the bottom of the list at No. 102.


Read more: MarketWatch: Denver is nation's 6th-best city for business | Denver Business Journal

Lonely Planet rates Denver a top 10 U.S. place to go

Denver Business Journal
Date: Thursday, December 16, 2010, 5:44pm MST

Denver has been named one of the “Top 10 Places to Go in the U.S. for 2011” by travel-guide publisher Lonely Planet.

“It’s like Paris in the West,” Lonely Planet gushes.

The 10 destinations were chosen via a staff survey. In a press release, Lonely Planet praises Denver’s cultural attractions and shopping as well as its access to “some of the best skiing in the country.”

“Even though Boulder often gets all the love, we highly recommend Denver,” Lonely Planet says. “This sparkly-clean mile-high city is nestled amid beautiful mountains yet urban delights abound.

“The Denver Art Museum, designed by Daniel Libeskind, is an architectural feat where you can see modern art as well as historical exhibitions. The shopping area near 16th Street features some fabulous stores including Tattered Cover – one of our favorite independent bookstores in the U.S. And I.M. Pei, who designed the Louvre pyramid, also designed several projects in Denver like the Mile High Center and Courthouse Square.”

It’s the first time Denver has appeared on the annual list.

Richard Scharf, president and CEO of the Visit Denver visitors and convention bureau, compared the Lonely Planet accolade to “winning an Oscar.”

Speaking at Thursday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new Embassy Suites hotel downtown, he noted that several of the cities in Lonely Planet’s 2010 top 10 saw increases in visitors this year.

“It’s great news that the rest of the world is beginning to discover what we Coloradoans have known for a long time — that Denver is an exciting city and a wonderful travel destination,” Scharf said in a statement.

Denver appears at No. 6 on Lonely Planet’s 2011 list. Also included:

• 1. Southern Utah, including Zion and Bryce Canyon national parks.

• 2. New Orleans.

• 3. New York City.

• 4. Austin and west Texas.

• 5. Savannah, Ga.

• 7. Northern California.

• 8. Grand Canyon National Park.

• 9. Palm Springs, Calif.

• 10 Hawaii.

Forecast sees slow, steady growth in Colorado

Denver Business Journal - by Neil Westergaard

The new year likely won't herald a big economic recovery in Colorado or the rest of the nation, with slow, steady growth predicted to continue in 2011, according to a new forecast.

That's the view of University of Colorado economist Richard Wobbekind. He's scheduled to present his annual forecast on Monday.

In a preview Friday put out by the Economic Development Coalition of Colorado, Wobbekind is quoted as saying employment growth will continue to lag next year.

"I think the overall economic picture for Colorado in 2011 is slow, steady growth much like the national economy," Wobbekind said. "We would all like a more rapid recovery, especially in terms of jobs, but we're just not going to see that yet."

His forecast is a big improvement over the 140,000 jobs lost in the state between 2009 and 2010. Wobbekind pegs total job gain in 2011 at about 10,100 jobs.

Wobbekind will expand on his predictions Monday during the 46th annual Colorado Business Economic Outlook Forum, hosted by CU-Boulder's Leeds School of Business and BBVA Compass Bank.

Strongest employment sectors appear to be professional and business services, including engineers, computer systems designers and scientific research and development groups. The sector is expected to add 7,000 jobs in 2011, well off of the 16,100 jobs the sector added in 2007, before the recession.

The construction, manufacturing, information and government sectors are likely to shed jobs, according to Wobbekind.

Leisure and hospitality, education and health services and trade, transportation and utilities sectors jobs are expected to add 9,800 new jobs, but together they can't completely offset job losses in the other categories.

"All the job growth in these sectors is still subpar in a historical context," Wobbekind said. "It will not be enough to bring down the unemployment rate in any meaningful way or create great momentum in the state economy, but at least it's moving in the right direction. It is just moving at a slower pace than we would like."

Colorado's jobless rate was 8.4 percent in October, the most recent month reported. The national rate was 9.8 percent in November.

Looking back on 2010, Colorado did not see the recovery in employment anticipated by many economists, the new forecast says. From that perspective, the state lagged the nation in recovery.

"We went in thinking we would be in the top 15 or states for job growth in 2010, but came out in the bottom 10," Wobbekind said.

The financial recession has caused many businesses to do more with less. Until businesses are sure that revenues are back up, it's unlikely to see large increases in total employment, he said.

"We've seen tremendous investment in capital in the economy in the last year and a half," Wobbekind said. "Companies are buying machines as opposed to hiring people. In the long run this is great for the U.S. economy, but in the short term it is very painful in terms of unemployment rates."

Until banks and other lenders start lending again, economic growth is going to be blunted, he said.

"As we've seen, we're out of the recession a year and a half now and we're still not seeing lending back at pre-recession levels," Wobbekind said.

One somewhat bright spot is Colorado's tourism and hospitality sector. Most categories are predicted to remain level or increase slightly.

"Unfortunately, there remain a number of concerns in the tourism sector," Wobbekind said. "The hassle factor is coming up to the top of the list. It's not only driving to the high country, but in terms of flying, between security issues and rising ticket costs, a lot of people just don't know if they want to take it on anymore. But, overall, we're expecting a pretty good year for tourism."