There are about twice as many job openings in Columbia than there are people looking for a job, according to the Columbia Chamber of Commerce — a gap of roughly 3,000 people that the Chamber is looking for ways to fill.
At an Oct. 1 meeting, the Chamber's vice president of external affairs Lily White Boyd announced a new “Boomerang” program, a joint venture with the City of Columbia intended to entice former residents to move back to the city and take open jobs.
Samantha Chandler, director of marketing and communications with the Columbia Chamber of Commerce, said a particular focus of the program will be those who left Columbia for their careers, but who are now looking for a place to settle down — including University of Missouri alumni and those who grew up in the area.
“You're moving away for that big job or that big city life,” she said, “but then as you've kind of grown in your career or as you start changing in your life… you start looking back at what you want.”
Chandler said the program will include targeted advertising campaigns in cities with large MU alumni populations, as well as Columbia-themed gift boxes to send to former residents. She said the “nostalgic factor” is a key aspect of the program’s marketing.
“We want them to remember those feelings of being in Columbia, and come back to work here for some of our jobs that we have available,” she said.
Across the state, Missouri has 91 available workers for every 100 open jobs, according to a report by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which categorizes Missouri’s worker shortage as “severe.” The same is true for other states around the Midwest: Kansas, Iowa, Arkansas and Indiana are among those considered “severe” as well.
That’s led more cities across the country to establish programs to encourage new households to move in — offering everything from cash bonuses and gym memberships to assistance with job placement and school enrollment.
Those programs have found a home on websites like MakeMyMove, which acts as a marketplace, matching communities with potential new residents. Evan Hock, the Indiana-based company’s co-founder, said initiatives like “Boomerang” tap into what people want from a potential new home.
“They're looking for quality of life, maybe affordability, maybe access to just more community connection,” he said. “They really want to move where they feel like they'll belong… What I love about Columbia's program is that it’s a pretty direct invitation.”
He said Columbia fits the bill of the kinds of towns that have had success on MakeMyMove. College towns, with their lively communities, tend to be popular destinations on the website, particularly across the more affordable center of the country.
“These are places that are great places to live, and people need a reason to move there,” Hock said.
Chandler said the ex-Columbians in the cities the program will target — Dallas, Chicago, Denver — typically are used to a higher cost of living than in Columbia. The goal of the program is to get people thinking about Columbia again, and potentially start comparing those numbers.
“You may go to say, Dallas, and experience it and really like it, but you can't afford it anymore, so you're looking for other places,” she said. “Columbia has a great workforce that also can have a cost of living that is easier to obtain.”
Hock said it’s common for programs to be successful among former residents — just over half of those who use MakeMyMove have some prior connection to the community, he said — but that cities rarely target those people specifically.
“I think increasingly communities are using these as a way to bring back maybe the folks that they had exported before… But I think from just the press I've seen, Columbia is one of the early adopters,” he said.
Chandler said the City of Columbia and the Chamber of Commerce plan to offer the “Boomerang” incentives for the next three years, though she was unable to give an estimate of the program’s cost over that time.
