Survey Results Released On Sartell Medical and Business Park

SARTELL - The survey results are in on a rapidly growing business park in Sartell.

A survey of business and land owners in the area unofficially known as the Sartell medical and business park was recently conducted.  The results of that survey are now available.

On makeup of businesses in that area:
-53 percent of businesses are in the healthcare field, 21 percent in the professional or financial services field, 12 percent in food service/retail and 7 percent in education.

On the longevity of businesses in that area:
-The area has been growing rapidly: More than one in three businesses (35 percent) has been there five or fewer years; 39 percent have been there from 6-10 years; and 19 percent have been there 11 or more years.

On where the businesses in that area came from:
-While 37 percent started their businesses in that neighborhood, the rest (59 percent) relocated there from elsewhere in the Greater St. Cloud area. None of them relocated from elsewhere in Minnesota or beyond. (The other 4 percent reflects “no response” to the question.)

On whether businesses are happy there:
-Only one business said it’s considering relocating out of the neighborhood.

On where their customers come from:
-93 percent said their customers/clients/patients come from the Greater St. Cloud area, but more than one-quarter (28 percent) also get customers from the Twin Cities area and more than half (53 percent) have customers come from neighboring businesses.

On what owners would like to see happen in that area:
-More than half (53 percent) would like to see the neighborhood fully developed in five years, with a waiting list of companies wishing to locate there. Twenty-one percent would like the neighborhood to remain similar to how it is now; only 3 percent would like more residential housing there.

In a question that invited respondents to choose as many answers as they wished, “accessibility” was identified most often as a negative or challenge, by 47 percent. The next most frequently identified negative or challenge was “visibility,” by 29 percent. Twenty-one percent said there are no negatives or challenges to operating in that neighborhood.

The online survey was emailed on February 25th to 58 organizations in that Sartell neighborhood, 35 responded.