Idris Mootee, CEO of the Toronto-based strategic innovation consulting firm Idea Couture Inc., has lived in major cities around the world. His company has offices in San Francisco, Shanghai, and Washington, D.C. While the workforces in New York and San Francisco can be like a rollercoaster, he says, Toronto is different.
"The No. 1 thing is it's a good talent base here when you're looking at engineers, consultants," he says. "Most of the people here are starting families. It's generally a good place to raise kids with the healthcare system." And that means great workforce stability, he adds.
Prospective business owners should be warned that they will need to pay into the Canadian equivalent of Social Security, Canada Pension. But Pyatt points out that providing healthcare benefits will cost far less than it does in America due to the country's universal healthcare system.
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Step 6: Secure Financing
Toronto is the headquarters for the country's banking sector, and those national banks are highly regulated. There are fewer banks here than there are in The United States, but they offer financial services with which Americans are familiar. Most of Canada's banks also have locations abroad, and 44 bank subsidiaries have locations in Toronto.
"Banking is very safe, secure, and highly accessible," Pyatt says. "We're a leader in electronic banking and electronic accessibility from the get-go."
Looking for investment? That might be a bit trickier. Venture capitalists in Canada are known for being conservative, so entrepreneurs might encounter some risk-aversion. However, thoughtful strategic investing helps keep the local economy solid. When Canadian VCs do act, Roos says, "they make good decisions."
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Step 7: Choose a Neighborhood
Toronto regularly tops most livable cities lists, in part because it has a large percentage of parkland. Mootee says that it's been easy for his company to hire employees from overseas and get them set up in town. "It's like a cleaner, greener version of New York," he says.
The immigrant population is so large that the city has several Chinatowns and Little Italys, in addition to dozens of ethnic neighborhoods. "Torontonians have international business experience, international connections," Roos says.
In addition to districts known for fashion and technology, the city has 70 business improvement areas, where local businesses are working with City Hall to draw residents to their goods and services. And at the day's end, the downtown core stays hopping because residents can easily live close to where they work.
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Step 8: Find Office Space
Real estate vacancy rates for real estate are between 6 and 7 percent, Pyatt says. While funkier post-and-beam spaces do exist and industrial buildings are being converted to offices, Toronto has more than 100 new high-rise buildings under construction.
Being such an environmentally conscious city, those new millions of square feet in office space are primarily LEED-certified, meaning they have the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design green building designation.
For businesses that are building a new facility or planning to retrofit a space, Pyatt says there are tax increment equivalent investment grants for some sectors if spending hits $1 million (Canadian dollars). Eligible development receives a grant for up to 60 percent of the increase in applicable municipal taxes over a 10-year period.
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Step 9: Tap Into Transit
The expansive Toronto Transit Commission's system of subways and rapid transit routes carries one million people daily. One of the cleanest in the world, the system received a $1.5 billion (Canadian) investment in for five new light rail routes, Pyatt says.
The Toronto Pearson International Airport is the country's largest, as well as the busiest. It also recently introduced free Wi-Fi. Toronto is only a one-hour flight or less from about half the U.S. population, Roos says. Being so close to the U.S. border, Toronto's highway access makes it ideal for companies specializing in exporting and manufacturing that need just-in-time deliveries.
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Step 10: Make the Move
Americans relocating to Toronto will likely feel at home, culturally. "The only main cultural difference I can find is that Canadians tend to be a little bit more demure and a little less aggressive," Prevette says. No surprise then that Toronto has been far too modest about its strengths.
"We're just a well-kept secret," Pyatt observes. Not for long, eh?
