Florida Ranks 3rd For Most Businesses Owned By Military Veterans But 39th In Percentages
According to a report, from the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy, the Sunshine State has 176,727 veteran owned businesses with revenue of $61.9 billion. Nationally, veterans own 2.45 million businesses and employ about six million workers. This accounts for about 9 percent of America’s total businesses.
California and Texas surpassed Florida as the states with the most veteran-owned businesses. These states also have the highest number of veterans. Florida’s total population is about 19 million people with a veteran population of about 1.65 million. According to the Veterans Administration, the veteran population in Texas is about 1.69 million and the veteran population in California is about 1.98 million.
Although this appears to be good news in terms of the most veteran owned businesses per state on a state-by-state survey, Florida still ranks far behind the average when it comes to the number of veteran owned businesses versus civilian owned businesses within the state of Florida. Compared to other states regarding that ratio, Florida ranks 39th, according to news articles recently published by the Tampa Tribune and the Orlando Sentinel.
The top five states in terms of percentage of veteran owned vs. civilian owned businesses are South Carolina, West Virginia, Virginia, Tennessee and Alabama.
The Florida Small Business Development Center (FSBDC) provides targeted programs and services to help veterans successfully transition into owning and operating their own small business. Over the last 10 years, the FSBDC Network has served 26,758 veterans through consulting, training and information. Its efforts have resulted in 1.1 million jobs created and saved; $284 million in sales revenue growth; $913.3 million in government contracts awarded; $53 million in capital accessed; and 795 new businesses created.
