Allen County, KS has 1.3× fewer cleaning and janitorial businesses per resident than the national average.
Allen County, KS has 3 with employees and 29 without — 32 janitorial and cleaning services in total, 25.7 per 10,000 residents against a national rate of 32.7. That's 1.3× fewer than average (US Census, County Business Patterns + Nonemployer Statistics 2023).
- In Allen County
- 3
- Per 10k residents
- 25.7
- National rate
- 32.7
- Ratio
- 1.3× fewer than average
Population 12,466. Ranked 16 of 28 Kansas counties with enough cleaning services data to compare — 1 = fewest per resident.
Source: US Census County Business Patterns ↗Allen County, KS has 2 fewer janitorial and cleaning services with employees than in 2017 — 5 then, 3 now, down 40%. Nationally the count grew 14% over the same years.
Allen County moved against the national direction over these years. That is the part worth asking about locally — the data says it happened, not why.
What this doesn't tell you: Census counts how many exist each year, not how many opened or closed. A drop of 2 could be 2 closures — or 10 closures and 8 openings. It also can't see solo operators without employees, in any year.
Series runs 2017–2023. Earlier vintages exist but are not comparable: Census changed which small counties it publishes after 2016, so including them would show counties losing an industry that never left.
Census code 561720 covers janitorial and cleaning services — everything from commercial office-cleaning contractors to residential house-cleaning companies, counted as one industry.
The blind spot: This code is dominated by commercial janitorial contractors cleaning offices on contract, which is a different business from cleaning houses. A high count can mean the county has plenty of office cleaners and very few residential ones.
What this doesn't tell you: A low count can mean an opening — or that there's less local demand for it. This counts how many businesses exist, including sole proprietors, but not how many customers want one. Treat it as a lead to check, not a verdict.
County Business Patterns counts establishments with paid employees. A solo operator with no payroll — the most likely competitor for most of these businesses — is invisible to it, in every county, including this one.
Fewer of these per resident than the country average is a reason to look, not a reason to start. The two explanations the data cannot separate are “nobody has served this yet” and “there is less to serve here” — a county with few pool services may simply have few pools. The next step is not a business plan, it is ten phone calls to people in Allen County who would pay for it.
Census counts these as one industry, so the 3 above includes all of them together. It cannot tell you how many are any single one.
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