Number of business applications has grown over the past 20 years

The number of new businesses opening in Clark County has climbed over the past two decades.

Tamara Landsberg’s Beyond Le Veils Bridal, which opened earlier this year in Vancouver Plaza, is among the businesses contributing to that increase.

Landsberg could have opened her business elsewhere but she chose Vancouver. The city is thriving, she said.

She offers customers an affordable one-stop wedding shop, which also has a charitable component that helps survivors of trauma.

As the county’s population has continued to grow, so have the number of new businesses that open here each year.

Business applications have steadily increased in Clark County over the past 20 years, according to June data from the U.S. Census Bureau. About 3,400 applications were submitted in 2005, less than half of the roughly 8,300 submitted in 2024.

Clark County had one of the highest numbers of applications in the state last year, trailing behind only King, Pierce, Snohomish and Spokane counties.

Beyond Le Veils isn’t Landsberg’s first business, nor is it her first in Clark County.

Every opening has been different, she said. Each with its own unique challenges and opportunities.

Dave Chaney is co-chair of the local chapter of the business mentorship program SCORE. He and other mentors from his program volunteer to help local business owners expand their businesses.

Chaney thinks the area’s growing population is helping to drive the rising number of new businesses here.

Many workers laid off from large, nearby corporate offices — especially former high-tech employees — are starting their own businesses, he said. He has also seen entrepreneurs delving into the service and food industries.

Chaney opened his own software consulting company here in 1998, drawn by the area’s more favorable tax environment for himself and his employees.

But it was difficult. Fewer people lived here and the “Vantucky” moniker was alive and well. Not anymore.

“We’ve seen an awful lot of professionals that lived on the Vancouver side of the river but worked in Portland that are now looking for opportunities to not have to cross the river,” Chaney said.