“Chapel Hill’s a nice place to live, but I wouldn’t want to start a business there.”
At least, that’s the sense I get from my Chapel Hill friends, who worry the town focuses too much on maintaining its (admittedly amazing) lifestyle and not enough on growth. Case in point: Chapel Hill wants to charge $760 to operate a food truck. In Durham, it costs just $75.
But there’s a new incubator in town, coming to the space 3 Birds Marketing currently occupies. If you can think of an incubator/bird joke here, feel free to mentally insert that now.
Under the proposed deal, 3 Birds will move to a new location and get free parking from the town IF the company grows from about 35 full-time employees today to 80 in 2014. Officials reportedly hope the new space will rival Durham’s American Underground.
This news means three things:
1) It’s time to send your resume to 3 Birds Marketing.
2) There’s yet another reason for a Durham/Chapel Hill rivalry.
3) Free parking is the most valuable currency in Chapel Hill.
So will it work? Can the People’s Republic of Chapel Hill embrace the unfettered spirit of capitalism? I think so. After all, it worked for China.
Ok, so obviously I live in Durham. But all kidding aside, I really hope this new incubator succeeds and brings even more energy to the Triangle startup scene.
That’s why I’ll give the good people of Chapel Hill one piece of free advice.
Want to know the real secret to attracting local entrepreneurs? Cheap food. You know, the kind that comes out of a truck.
