Macon County, NC has 2.5× fewer cleaning and janitorial businesses with employees per resident than the national average.
Macon County, NC has 3 janitorial and cleaning services with employees — 0.8 per 10,000 residents, against a national rate of 2.0. That's 2.5× fewer than average (US Census, County Business Patterns 2023).
- In Macon County
- 3
- Per 10k residents
- 0.8
- National rate
- 2.0
- Ratio
- 2.5× fewer than average
Population 38,430. Ranked 4 of 73 North Carolina counties with enough cleaning services data to compare — 1 = fewest per resident.
Source: US Census County Business Patterns ↗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 measures how many businesses exist, not how many customers want one, and it can't see solo operators without employees. 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 Macon 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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