DSM USA is Poised for a Strong Recovery

It is hard to imagine it has been more than a year since COVID-19 affected families, business and communities around the world. My own experience was shaped while traveling for work in late February and early March of 2020. While in Southern California attending business meetings, and planning to attend a large international trade show, concerns around the spreading virus started to grip the country. Event organizers, after mounting pressure from industry leaders, canceled the event one day before it was set to begin. Planes had landed, hotels were checked-in and booths had been built. Over the last year, it’s no longer surprising to hear about canceled events, concerts, vacations and in-person work. Having had definition to the start of the pandemic, we now look for definition and signals as to what will come next for economic opportunity and prosperity.

Investing in Economic Prosperity

In Greater Des Moines (DSM) we’ve studied how our region has continued to grow through recent recessions. We understand that continued, large and measured investments in ourselves has brought about great economic prosperity to our region, which has encouraged companies from around the world to invest and grow here. In a forum with community leaders last fall, James Chung, president of Reach Advisors, a strategy, research and predictive analytics firm, noted that DSM grew population, incomes, net worth and employment far faster than the rest of the country between 2015 – 2020. He noted DSM “outperforms all peers of its population size and finds meaningful comparisons with larger breakout cities such as Austin, Salt Lake City and Denver.” Chung’s findings pinpoint DSM’s high performance over this period came from large and targeted capital investments during the last recession that led to even more success in the ensuing expansion cycle.

DSM’s success comes from our belief of what we can accomplish through partnerships between public, private and nonprofit entities and investments into the future. As vaccination roll-out continues to gain momentum across the country, and business returns to face the future and thrive in lessons learned from the last year, DSM USA is ready to explore the future with you.

Please see some recent news from our region in this newsletter and send an email or call to connect. Find me at the contact info below:

Brian Crowe
Executive Vice President, Economic Development
Greater Des Moines Partnership
(515) 444-8653
Send me an e-mail
Connect with me on LinkedIn

Throughout Greater Des Moines’ (DSM’s) 10-county region, a thriving economic environment is attracting more Investors to do business. Learn more about other recent development projects in the region.

Discover more about The Partnership’s tools to help Greater Des Moines (DSM) startups and small businesses develop and grow their ventures with The Partnership’s Small Business Resources.

You can count on The Partnership to continue to share accurate and fact-based updates. See more on COVID-19 here.