Florida ranks third, nationwide, in terms of the number of black-owned businesses, which grew by more than 77 percent between 2002-2007, the U.S. Census Bureau said on Wednesday.
African Americans owned 102,053 nonfarm U.S. businesses in Florida in 2002, but by 2007 that had increased to 181,437, representing 9.4 percent of all such firms. Similarly, receipts have also grown from $5.7 billion in 2002 to $10.6 billion in 2007, an increase of 86 percent, the survey revealed.
New York had the most black-owned firms at 204,093 (10.6 percent) with receipts of $12.9 billion in 2007. Georgia accounted for 183,876 black-owned businesses with receipts of $8.9 billion. While California had a total of 137,932 black-owned firms, that state topped the list with $18.9 billion in receipts in 2007.
Nationwide, between 2002 to 2007, the number of black-owned businesses increased by 60.5 percent to 1.9 million, more than triple the national rate of 18.0 percent. Over the same period, receipts generated by black-owned businesses increased 55 percent to $137.5 billion.
“Black-owned businesses continued to be one of the fastest growing segments of our economy, showing rapid growth in both the number of businesses and total sales during this time period,” said Census Bureau Deputy Director Thomas Mesenbourg, in a statement.
These new data come from the Survey of Business Owners: Black-Owned Business: 2007. The survey provides detailed information every five years for black-owned businesses, including the number of firms, sales and receipts, number of paid employees and annual payroll.
