Portland, From Worst to First

The public perception of Portland has made a quick turn-around since Business Week ranked Portland as the #1 unhappiest city in America. Its been almost a year since our city was given that title and oh how times have changed. A recent article by Laura Rich on FastCompany.com explains why Portland is now one of the 10 best cities in the country for start-ups. In her article, Why You Should Start a Company in..., Laura noted:

"It rains an average of 155 days of the year in Portland, Oregon, which sits near the coast between Silicon Valley and Seattle. That may be what drives some startups and engineers indoors to coffeehouses armed with laptops to hatch ideas such as MyOpenId, Voyager Capital-backed AboutUs, interactive TV company Ensequence, which raised $20 million last year, and ShopIgniter, which just closed a $3 million round from Seattle's Madrona. Quite a list. They make up part of what some call “Silicon Forest,” and the city clearly sees its future: In February Mayor Sam Adams announced a $500,000 seed fund aimed at startups and small businesses."

She then documents her interview with Jive Software chairman, David Hersh, who has some pretty cool things to say about the city. My favorite quote by the chairman is:

"In terms of the startup phase, I mean there's so much energy around that--around the ideas and going off on your own and there's so much support for doing that that I think it's one of the great things about the city. It's just the overall psyche of the city around its kind of aggressive independence that makes for a very vibrant startup culture."

I thought this was a great description of the culture in the city and the pride Portlanders carry. I know specifically at Cascade, we support PDX's business mindset in everything we do, from our train car office to our customizable, innovative web solutions (cough, cough...brandlive).

Portland might be a little sluggish getting up from the blow the recession hit us with, but we're definitely not hanging our heads. Thanks Fast Money for putting us back on top.

The entire Fast Money article can be viewed here.