January 2003
Press Release
New Business Starts
Highest in Decade
Filings with Vermont's Secretary of State's Office Show marked
Growth in New Business Starts for 2002
Press Release
For
Immediate Release January 21, 2003
Contact: Marianne Lynch
802-828-2148
New
Business Starts Highest in Decade
Filings with Vermont's Secretary of
State's Office Show marked Growth
in New Business Starts for
2002
Montpelier. Secretary of State Deb Markowitz announced
today that the number of new businesses registered with her office's
Corporations division during the year 2002 increased markedly from
previous years. The 8371 new business starts in 2002 represent the
highest number of new filings her office has seen over a
decade.
"The fact that there were so many more new businesses
this year than last is good news," said Secretary Markowitz. "Our
business starts statistic is a good barometer of confidence within the
business community and shows that Vermont's economy continues to support
business growth." "Our business starts statistic tells an interesting
story in light of our sluggish economy." Markowitz said, "The marked
growth in business starts is likely the result of Vermonters’
entrepreneurial spirit. When times get tough, Vermonters look for new
ways to make ends meet – and starting a small business may be one of
those ways." According to Markowitz, corporate dissolutions have begun
to stabilize as well. The 892 dissolutions in 2002 represent an
improvement from the 971 dissolutions seen in 2001.
The 8371 new Vermont business starts in 2002 include
businesses that have been formed as corporations, as limited liability
companies and those using a tradename. While every form of business
entity saw growth, much of this year’s increase comes from a jump in
tradename registrations. The 1863 new tradenames filed in 2002 represent
an increase of nearly 500 tradenames from the new filings registered in
2001. In addition, we have seen a resurgence in the number of foreign
(non-Vermont) corporations registering in Vermont.
It is also notable that Vermont businesses are
continuing to form new Limited Liability Corporations (LLC). LLC's are a
new type of business entity authorized by the legislature in 1995. "Over
the past five years the number of new LLCs has increased by about 300 a
year," said Secretary Markowitz. "It is not surprising that there
continues to be a lot of activity among limited liability companies,"
said Markowitz, "LLCs are the wave of the future in the business
community because they offer both flexibility in organizational
structure and tax status. It will be interesting to see how much more
growth in new filings we experience with this business entity before
filings begin to level off."
In addition to seeing marked growth in for-profit
enterprises, the Secretary of State's office also continued to
experience a high filing level of non-profit corporations. For the past
five years there has been nearly 400 new non-profit corporations
registered each year.
As of January 1, 2003, the approximate number of
"active" registrations are: 15,880 Vermont domestic corporations; 6,730
nonprofit corporations; 7,000 foreign corporations; 35,700 small
business registrations (trade names) and 5,600 limited liability
companies.
The Office of the Vermont Secretary of State licenses
and registers foreign and domestic corporations, non-profits, LLCs, and
Tradenames and is the repository for Uniform Commercial Code Filings.
Information about the services offered by the Corporations division,
including registration forms and searchable databases are available at
www.sec.state.vt.us.
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