Business Investment and Economic Activity in Halton for Q1 2008

The Halton Region Business Development Centre has just released its first quarter 2008 report on business investment and economic activity in Halton. Included in the report are highlights for the region from the Statistics Canada 2006 census, investment highlights, key economic indicators, development activities, real estate market and residential overviews, and small business facts. View the full report called Q1 2008 Business Development Report.

Small Business Indicators for Halton Region

The following is notable for small business from the report’s economic indicators section (% change Q1 2007 to Q1 2008):

1. Total population for the region grew by 3%
2. Employment rate grew 3.4%; unemployment fell compared to the Toronto CMA by 1.6%
3. Number of businesses fell by 1%
4. Number of business bankruptcies increased by 13.8% (from 29 in 2007 to 33 in 2008)
5. Average household income rose by 2.3% to $113,100
6. Average housing prices rose by 25.9%
7. Speculative office construction was strong in Burlington and Oakville; industrial warehousing and distribution facilities grew in Milton
8. Total housing starts were up 46.3% with Milton showing an unprecedented 91.1%
9. 22% of all private sector enterprises employed 1 to 4 employees and 88% of all private sector enterprises had fewer than 10 employees; the total number of private sector enterprises in Halton was 37,065, mostly in Burlington and Oakville
10. The largest number of businesses in Halton were involved in the following industries: Professional Services - 20%, Finance/Insurance/Real Estate – 14.7%, Wholesale/Retail – 14.5%, Business Support Services – 10.2%, Construction/Utilities – 10%
    

Statistics Canada's Market Research Handbook: Great Info for Small Business!

Statistics Canada released the latest edition of its Market Research Handbook on April 8, 2008. This 378 page document is available to download for FREE. Should you wish to review a paper copy, check with your local public library in the next week or so as many of them will receive copies for use in their collections.


Why should you use this handbook? It contains tons of annually-collected statistics plus census 2006 data suitable for planning and growing small businesses with topics such as:

• Population Demographics, including B2B Demographics
• Labour Market and Income Statistics
• Consumer Expenditures
• Housing and Household Characteristics
• Macroeconomic and Financial Statistics including Supply Chain
• International Trade
• Business and Industry Statistics including Business Demographics
• Census Metropolitan Areas and Census Agglomerations
• Projections
  
  

U.S. Economic Census: Get the Facts on Doing Business in the U.S.

Do you do business with the U.S.? Do you want to set up a business in the U.S.? If you answered yes to either of these questions, consider looking at the U.S. Economic Census data.

The U.S. Economic Census takes place every five years in years ending in 2 and 7. Recently, 4,700,000 census forms were mailed out. The Economic Census profiles American business from the national to the local level.

Click here to see an interesting "Facts for Features" collection of U.S. statistics relating to various types of businesses. For example, find out what the average per capita spending is at drinking establishments and what services landscapers typically offer. To see more economic census releases with data from the last census (2002), click here.

The main U.S. Census Bureau page is located at this address: http://www.census.gov/. It includes population and state/community facts and figures as well as economic indicators and statistics (i.e. housing starts, total business sales) too. Click here for links to business and industry data.

Make More Sense of the Census

Need census stats written in plain English (or French) in order to build your market profile? Don't have the time or skills to do the analytical work required to make sense of the census data?

As a followup to my last post, click here for a link to a free copy the winter 2007 issue of Statistics Canada's Canadian Social Trends. This free, monthly publication contains analytical articles presenting some of the census data in words with supporting tables, graphs and charts. Based on 2006 census data, this issue provides census snapshots of Canadian urbanization, population (age and sex) and families. The issue also contains articles on trends in transitioning with young adults, home ownership and young adults, and re-accreditation and occupations of immigrant doctors and engineers.

More Potential Canadian Customers! Demographic Profiling

The Canadian population is now above 33 million people. Think about it: more people = more potential customers!

Click here to see the December 19, 2007 population estimates release from Statistics Canada. This release details which provinces showed the most and least growth due to births over deaths, immigration and interprovincial migration.

Demographic Profiling

That's great, you say, but how can someone build a business based on other demographic information? Do you want to find out who lives where: adults, teenagers, children, male/female? How can you find out the languages that are spoken in a particular community? How can you slice and dice the available demographic data to target a specific audience for your business' products and services?

Statistics Canada is always a good place to start and 2006 census data is now in the midst of being released, much of it for free. To quickly create a demographic profile of a community, go to:

1. Statistics Canada: http://www.statcan.ca/ and select either English or French.
2. Click on the "Community Profiles" link, type in the desired place name with the appropriate province and click on the Search button.
3. Click on the match to your place name and the next page that appears in the "All Data" default. This provides details of your place name with male/female data compared to its corresponding provincial data: population and dwelling counts, age characteristics, marital status, dwelling data, family and household characteristics, language, immigrant and citizenship status, generation status and mobility status.

Demographics at the Postal Code Level!

Should you require more specific data, say to a particular postal code level, you can use Census Tract profiles. Using census tracts, you can target customers in specific geographic areas with populations from 2500 to 8000 people. There are three different ways to get to these small slices of demographic data, one being using postal codes. Click here to do this.

Language Data

Statistics Canada census data is released over time so check the releases periodically; some data is free and some is not. Some of the language data was released on December 4, 2007, much of it free and containing some excellent detailed data. Click here for access to this data.

By viewing/downloading a particular table (click on the numbered product), you can view such things as language knowledge by the population in a specific city. To do this:

1. Click on one of the catalogue product numbers i.e. Cat. No. 97-555-X2006016
2. Click on the "View/download this product" button
3. Click on the "Geographic index" link
4. Scroll down the page and click on your target geographic area's name
5. View or print the page or download the data in various formats (i.e. comma-delimited to use with Excel)

As an example, click here to show language knowledge in Oakville, Ontario.