Large businesses are essential in Santa Clarita because they employ thousands of people. However, according to Mayor Bill Miranda, at least, most of the money made by larger businesses leaves the city. Small companies, however, tend to keep their profits within Santa Clarita, making the small business vital to the health and wealth of the area.
A Great Infrastructure for Small Businesses
The Santa Clarita Valley is home to the third-largest city in L.A. County and is only 30 miles from downtown L.A. itself. The area is a great place to start a business, with much of the infrastructure of larger cities, without the huge overheads. With five major industries located in the area, including aerospace, medical devices and digital media, there is 30 million square foot of industrial and commercial real estate available.
Santa Clarita is a great place to work hard and play hard. With an excellent infrastructure for an active lifestyle, the city has a hometown, family vibe to it, but there is still a lot to do and so many things to explore. The city is also close to 2 major airports – Burbank is a 25-minute drive away, and L.A. International Airport is 45 minutes.
As an employer, you can also take advantage of the graduates from local institutions such as the California Institute of Arts. With many graduates choosing to stay in the area, the talent pool is diverse and deep.
Covid-19 and Remote Businesses
Before the pandemic hit the shores of America, remote work was already a trend that the likes of WordPress had successfully implemented. Covid-19 has created a forced experiment in remote work, with many questions around security and productivity being answered.
With remote work and office-less businesses now fully legitimized, the door has opened for entrepreneurs to found their dream businesses without the substantial overheads associated with an office lease.
While remote startups have increased dramatically since the pandemic, many have opted to use a hybrid model, using offices and even hotel function rooms as a place to work from several days per week.
In line with the increase in demand, businesses such as Progent now offer “Fast, Low-cost Remote Computer Network Troubleshooting for Santa Clarita, California Small Companies.” By providing consulting services, cloud hosting and network infrastructure support, companies such as Progent can help small businesses connect securely so that they can collaborate efficiently online while working from home.
Why the Rise In Remote Businesses?
There has been a shift in the fashion and nature of establishing startups, particularly tech startups in California. In 2020, San Francisco was still the hub of tech startups, but the pandemic has caused a fundamental shift in the way we work and where we work. According to this tweet by YCombinator co-founder Paul Graham, there has been a monumental shift in tech startups, with a considerable number preferring to start a remote operation instead of being located in a major tech center such as San Francisco.
But why has this happened?
The tech industry is never one to stick to convention. If there is an opportunity to do things more efficiently, then they’ll usually jump on it. The pandemic also made remote businesses in all sectors more legitimate, and the technology required to support remote businesses and distributed teams is pretty much complete. Pre pandemic, around 5% of the U.S. population, worked remotely, jumping to 45% by the summer of 2020.
With virtual offices, virtual receptionists and software such as Slack, Zoom, Asana are now meaningfully deployable at scale – without a major price tag. This has allowed companies to work remotely without any issues. There have always been questions regarding productivity and whether or not people would enjoy working at home, but all these questions appear to have been answered during the pandemic and the enforced remote working operations.
Nomadic Remote Work
With many major companies across the U.S. offering a work from anywhere policy, many workers have moved away from major cities such as L.A. to the likes of Santa Clarita. Taking things to the next level, thousands have moved to a different country or adopted a nomadic lifestyle, living and working from an R.V. or campervan.
The term “digital nomad” has been around for a few years now, but the ability to work remotely has never been greater. There are many remote jobs advertised in Santa Clarita, for example, but you can live virtually anywhere in the world with an internet connection to do the jobs.
You could rent out your home and live in an R.V. quite comfortably while traveling America and taking in many adventures. You could also take advantage of earning a U.S. wage, but living in Mexico, where the cost of living is said to be 100% cheaper. Many hotels and other forms of accommodation in Mexico are set up to attract remote workers with co-living and co-working packages.
The Littler Annual Survey Report, carried out in May 2021, found that just over half of employers plan to offer a mix of hybrid and remote work to employees. While tech startups may prefer to work 100% remotely, the fact that most major companies are looking to work with a hybrid model may well be good news for the likes of Santa Clarita. A hybrid model offers a range of benefits for employees, but it will mean that jobs are unlikely to be outsourced overseas as a physical presence will be required inside the office at least once per week. This could also be good news for commercial real estate investors. While warehousing has seen an enormous increase in demand thanks to the pandemic, the remote working revolution has hit the office leasing sector extremely hard.
