STL Ranked #1 City To Startup In The U.S.

St. Louis was ranked No. 1 in The 14 Best Startup Cities in America, according to the editors of Popular Mechanics.

“When Anheuser-Busch was sold in 2008, St. Louis's unemployment rate was about 6 percent and rising sharply. (It peaked 15 months later at 10 percent.) That's when a consortium of business leaders, the state economic development agency, the St. Louis chamber of commerce, and the universities devised a plan to create jobs by creating startups,” the editors write.

“From 2011 to 2013 the ecosystem supporting entrepreneurs more than doubled in size with the launch of eight makerspaces (shops with tools like 3D printers and laser cutters), accelerators (early-stage investors and mentors), and coworking spaces (a shared office for startups, with low rent).”

Among promising signs in St. Louis, they pointed out CityArchRiver 2015, the $380 million effort to Revitalize the St. Louis riverfront and to better connect the Gateway Arch with the city.

They also spotlit T-Rex, a shared work space and startup hub on Washington Avenue, which now offers 80,000 square feet of office space for fledgling companies. One tenant is Betaversity, the brainchild of Washington University biology student Blake Marggraff, 22, and two of his associates. The company's main product is the BetaBox Mobile Prototyping Lab, a work space with 3D printers, laser cutters, CNC routers, and more—all wedged into a shipping container.

"Our company has been around for about 11 months and served 22 clients, which is pretty crazy," Marggraff told the magazine. "We've been renting out BetaBoxes up and down the East Coast."

Betaversity received $50,000 from Arch Grants, which has awarded $3.1 million to 55 startups since 2011, according to executive director Ginger Imster.

"It's not the biggest scene," Marggraff said of St. Louis. "It is, however, extremely exciting, because it's one of the fastest accelerating.”