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Boston Mayor Menino Hails Inner
City Business Successes By
Tony Iallonardo Boston Mayor and U.S. Conference of Mayors Trustee Thomas M. Menino kicked off a press conference in Boston April 5 announcing the winners of the Inner City 100, an award that recognizes fast growing private companies thriving in America’s inner cities. The list is a one-of-a-kind project undertaken by Inc. magazine, the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City (ICIC, a Boston based non-profit) and the Conference to spotlight entrepreneurs who have tapped into the untapped markets of the nation’s core urban areas. “The award not only recognizes the new leaders of urban entrepreneurship, it recasts the image of the inner city,” said Menino, who was joined by several other mayors. The press conference was followed by a gala ceremony at the Boston Mariott Copley. The gala awards ceremony shines a national spotlight on the Inner City 100 and urban business successes in America’s inner cities. Presenting the awards were Earvin “Magic” Johnson, who was also the first recipient of the National Inner-City Leadership Award, Harvard Business School Professor Michael E. Porter and George Gendron, Editor-in-Chief of Inc. magazine. The Inner City 100 companies are an especially impressive group. These are no small-time mom-and-pop shops: their average compound annual growth rate from 1994 to 1998 is 50 percent, average five-year sales growth rate is 750 percent, and average annual revenues are $12.2 million. The inner-city workforce is benefiting, too. Forty-one percent of Inner City 100 employees reside in the inner city and their average hourly wage, excluding benefits, is $12.83 compared to the national private sector average of $12.77. This figure is 150 percent greater than the minimum wage. The Inner City 100 are responsible for creating close to 4,500 jobs and more than doubling their employment over the past five years. Finishing at the top of the rankings this year is Caribbean Shipping and Storage, a Jacksonville (FL) firm that provides inland and ocean transportation and storage. The firm had revenues in 1998 in excess of $20 million, and has had an incredible compound annual growth rate of 267 percent over five years. Best of all, most of the employees reside in the inner city, enjoy health care benefits, and earn wages in excess of the national average. The Inner City 100 is the latest of several projects undertaken by the Conference in recent months to remind Americans that cities remain the best place to do business today. Last November, the Conference released a landmark economic study showing that metropolitan economies have been the principal engine driving the nation’s prosperity. The report, compiled by Standard & Poor’s DRI showed that many metropolitan economies produce more goods and services than entire states or nations. Specifically, the report found:
In this election year, Conference of Mayors President and Denver Mayor Wellington E. Webb is bringing the agenda of cities directly to candidates for president. Webb has written a ten-point action plan called “A New Agenda for America’s Cities”. Among the proposals, Webb is calling upon the next president to step up federal efforts to promote the growth of untapped urban markets. Webb has invited the candidates to respond to his proposal by asking them to participate in the June 2000 Conference of Mayors Annual Meeting in Seattle. Under Webb’s leadership, the Conference embraced the opportunity to encourage businesses to participate in the Inner City 100. In calling for nominations for the award last year at the USCM Fall Leadership Meeting, Webb said, “Inner cities are filled with success stories. We are going to uncover and salute successful companies who are leveraging the competitive assets that inner cities have to offer.” This year, the Inner City 100 received over 900 nominations. This increase was partly due to ICIC’s partnership with the Conference of Mayors, which urged mayors to nominate companies for the 2000 Inner City 100. Fifty-two mayors and their economic development agencies responded with 250 nominations. “Mayors know that the inner city has the essential ingredients for business success — location, location, location. The entrepreneurs of the Inner City 100 are savvy men and women who have tapped into resources overlooked by their suburban counterparts, namely plentiful labor, abundant infrastructure, lower costs and proximity to all the treasures that cities have to offer,” said Menino. “I would say to the rest of corporate America — can you afford not to give the inner city a second look?” To be eligible for the Inner City 100, a company has to be an independent, privately-held for-profit corporation, partnership, or proprietorship (not a subsidiary or division) that has:
Nominees are ranked based on the percentage of increase in the companies’ gross revenues between 1994 and 1998 and must meet the following criteria:
The Inner City 100 will be published in the May 2000 issue of Inc. magazine. For more information on the winners and their cities, contact Tony Iallonardo at 202-293-7330.
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