Small business ownership and development are crucial for fostering innovation, generating wealth, and ensuring economic sustainability for individuals, neighborhoods, and regions. Since Hurricane Katrina slammed into coastal Louisiana in August 2005, the rate of new business startups has risen significantly, establishing metropolitan New Orleans as a leading hub for new entrepreneurs, as reflected in U.S. Census Bureau data. The increase in new businesses following both Hurricane Katrina and the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates a resilience seen in residents addressing immediate needs and planning to build family wealth.

Notably, the percentage of Black-owned firms with multiple employees in the Crescent City has increased by 24.5 percent since 2017. These businesses generate nearly five times more revenue per worker compared to Black-owned sole proprietorships. Business ownership is a key indicator of resilience and a significant highlight in metropolitan New Orleans’ recoveries in the 21st century.
In this report, I examine the entrepreneurial resilience of metropolitan New Orleanians after Hurricane Katrina and the failure of the federal levees in 2005, and then again after the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 to 2023. I detail a range of data on sole proprietorships and businesses with multiple employees by race and ethnicity, highlighting the growth of these businesses in the wake of the two disasters, especially among Black-owned and Latino or Hispanic-owned businesses. I then turn to the promise of leveraging commercial real estate and the support of nonprofit startup accelerators to promote more entrepreneurship, highlighting several individual success stories.
I close this report with several policy recommendations to sustain and accelerate the growth of entrepreneurialism in the New Orleans metropolitan region, among them:

Establishing a permanent Business Recovery and Resilience Fund
Expanding and incentivizing commercial real estate ownership
Revising zoning and land use policies to activate vacant commercial properties
Promoting community wealth-building and asset ownership

In these ways, metropolitan New Orleans’ small businesses can move beyond growth trajectories heavily influenced by the cyclical nature of recovering from disasters, and toward business growth that is steadier and more robust for all regional entrepreneurs.

 from Brookings Metro and The Data Center examining the New Orleans metro area across key policy areas including housing, community safety, and flood adaptation. The series provides local leaders with tools to mitigate future disaster risks for the most vulnerable communities.

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