Site Selection magazine ranks Sioux Falls No. 1 per capita for new, expanded projects
March 11, 2024
This paid piece is sponsored by the Sioux Falls Development Foundation.
Sioux Falls saw the most new and expanded projects in 2023 for any metro area its size based on population.
That ranked the city No. 1 in the annual report by Site Selection magazine, which looks at the number of projects from major employers that represent at least $1 million invested, 20 new jobs or 20,000 square feet of space.
“The idea is to track where company growth is happening by tracking where their facilities are expanding,” said Adam Bruns, editor-in-chief of Site Selection. “It tracks relocations but also expansion projects. We are not picking winners. We are letting the data speak to us.”
Sioux Falls was compared with 170 metro areas with populations between 200,000 and 1 million people.
In its headline reporting the story, Site Selection wrote: “Sioux Falls Rising” and said the city “has come seemingly out of nowhere.”
It noted projects such as a $45 million investment at Smithfield Foods, the announced 330,000-square-foot integrated service centers for Owens & Minor and Avera Health, a 40,000-square-foot expansion by Dakota Digital, the new corporate headquarters for Maguire and a $25 million investment from FedEx Freight at Foundation Park, along with others.
“We’ve had some incredible building activity and investment in recent years, and this ranking certainly firms how well we compare nationally,” said Bob Mundt, president and CEO of the Sioux Falls Development Foundation. “It’s a credit to the public-private partnerships and the community-minded nature of Sioux Falls that we’ve positioned ourselves to compete so well, and businesses clearly are responding.”
The Sioux Falls building project per capita ratio of 81.6 ranked it ahead of No. 2 metro area Reno, Nevada, at 70.4 and farther ahead of Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania; Dayton-Kettering, Ohio; Laredo, Texas; and Savannah, Georgia. Site Selection started its per capita ranking in 2020. Sioux Falls also earned the top spot in 2021.
Tier two communities, as the magazine called them, are getting “a lot more consideration” from corporations, Bruns said.
“Those tier two communities are getting more of a look because companies want to diversify their portfolio of locations and want to manage costs,” he said.
The strong performance of Sioux Falls also led to Site Selection ranking South Dakota the No.1 state for projects per capita, winner of the annual Governor’s Cup honor.
“Sioux Falls carries the water for the state of South Dakota,” Bruns said. “Over half the projects we counted for the state were in the Sioux Falls metro area.”
