STARKVILLE — Starkville has seen 23 new retailers and 22 new restaurants since January 2020.
While the COVID-19 pandemic proved to be a difficult time in economic development, Starkville continued to grow and prosper, Greater Starkville Development Partnership CEO and Director for Corporate and Economic Partnerships at Mississippi State University Mike Tagert told Starkville Rotarians Monday.
For the first time, the Starkville Area Chamber of Commerce, a branch of the Partnership, eclipsed 600 business members with a 92-percent retention rate.
“We’re very fortunate to live in a community where we see that kind of growth continually,” Tagert said.
Starkville’s 2-percent food and beverage and 1-percent hotel sales taxes have helped bring new developments and tourism to the city, Tagert said. Each year of the last decade, with the exception of 2020, has broken its own record in terms of generated revenue.
While the overall tourism loss for 2020 was 19-percent for the state, surrounding states saw a 30- to 40-percent loss. During a time when people were not traveling, Tagert said Starkville played a role in promoting tourism in the state by participating in the Mississippi Tourism Recovery Fund.
“Every state saw a dramatic loss in food and beverage tax, as well as lodging tax, over the course of the early days and the first year of the pandemic,” Tagert said. “Mississippi was the least impacted, and we think it’s due to the promotional efforts that were put in place during that time.”
Tagert said the Partnership works with other organizations throughout the city, such as the MSU Small Business Center and the MSU Center for Entrepreneurship and Outreach, to provide resources for entrepreneurship. He said the Partnership works daily to generate data and analytics to find the best mechanisms for all business partners.
Starkville was recently ranked the eighth-most visited city in the state in 2021, even passing Tupelo. More than $103 million came from visitation spending in the community last year.
With the development of Cornerstone Park, Starkville’s new baseball and softball complex which is set to open in August, and the Northstar Industrial Park, Tagert said he expects not only to see a great return on investment, but also the development of new jobs and residencies.
“If you look at what’s going on today and you look at all of the good investments in our community and you think about a major league of tourism sports facilities that is really going to ducktail into all of those SEC sports events, it’s going to make our lodging economy much stronger,” he said. “It’s going to diversify our economy. It’s going to have a tremendous impact.”
Starkville was designated a certified hometown retirement community in 2021 and named the best city in the state to retire by the Insurify Annual Report. With its multiple partnerships throughout the city and constant developments, Tagert said he believes the state of the city’s business community will continue to grow.
“I say our community is thriving and we’ve only scratched the bare surface of what’s to come,” Tagert said.
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