Based primarily on its availability of space and a thriving local creative industry, Popular Mechanics ranked Oakland third this year on a list of best cities in America for creating a startup business — beating out every other city in California.

“No disrespect to San Francisco or Brooklyn, but we wanted to identify the next wave of cities building an ecosystem to turn innovators into entrepreneurs,” wrote the editors of Popular Mechanics.

So why is Oakland ranked so highly on the list? The Popular Mechanics article attributes it to Oakland’s growing makerspace movement.
Makerspaces are large industrial spaces where makers – or creative people, artists, painters, designers, glass blowers, metal and steel works – rent communal spaces so that they can produce art, products, and gadgets to sell or show in art galleries and festivals.

According to Popular Mechanics, makerspaces like American Steel, The Crucible, 25th Street Collective and Nimby are just a few of the spaces that have helped make Oakland the makerspace destination of the East Bay.

“[Oakland] is a port city and the trains run through here, so it’s always been a manufacturing community. People have always been building and creating here,” said Margot Ledere Prado, senior economic development specialist for the City of Oakland. “There’s still that manufacturing community, but now there’s more skilled craftsmen and tradesmen in the community.”

Prado attributes growth of makerspaces in Oakland to a few things, the first being that Oakland has always been a manufacturing city.
She explained that manufacturers in Oakland have always been working with their hands, and with the maker movement it transitioned to artists doing similar hands on work.

Prado explained that artists and makers are also attracted to Oakland because over the years the city has remained affordable in comparison to other cities throughout the bay. According to real estate agency CityFeet, industrial space in San Francisco with 3,100 square feet is approximately $12,000 a month, whereas the same square footage a space in Oakland will cost renters around $6,500 a month.

If individual makers are not interested in renting their own spaces, makerspaces like 25th Street Collective in Oakland offer cheaper opportunities. Owner Hiroko Kurihara rents out spaces at her collective for $700 a month.

As makerspaces are on the rise in Oakland and have become a viable option for the starving artist, makers have gained more direct support from the City of Oakland.

“The City of Oakland granted the 25C [25th Street Collective] with $10,000 in redevelopment funds for handmade shelving units on wheels to define the individual spaces and some funds for signage and to improve our facade,” said Kurihara.

Besides helping individual makerspaces the City of Oakland also helped launch the organization Oakland Makers in 2013, by providing the non-profit with $25,000 to get started.

According to Oakland Makers, the organization is partnered with the city and supports the Industrial Arts Community and helps increase the visibility of local manufacturing innovators.

“There is a wellspring of creative, artisans and makers here in Oakland, from gutsy to high-tech. As the manufacturing sector continued to grow, we realized that we needed to create an organization that could support the creative economy here at every level, from education to expansion,” explained Kurihara, who is also one of the founders of Oakland Makers.

Oakland Makers will launch its “Made in Oakland” campaign later this year to help the makerspaces become more profitable in Oakland.
The campaign will feature a label which makers in Oakland can attach to all of the items they create. Prado explains that the label will hopefully encourage customers to purchase more locally made items.