Springfield MSA reaches 500K population

Mike O’Brien: Vital Farms added over 350 Springfield employees since 2017.

Metro Springfield reached a population milestone last month that should yield more business interest in the region, economic development officials say.

The population count for the Springfield metropolitan statistical area has exceeded the 500,000-person mark for the first time, according to estimates released March 26 by the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Springfield MSA – comprising Greene, Christian, Dallas, Polk and Webster counties – recorded a July 1, 2025, population of 500,694. That’s a growth rate of 5.3% over the April 1, 2020, Census base of 475,435. Greene and Christian counties account for roughly 81% of the MSA population, which is consistent with 2020 data.

Reaching the 500,000-population barrier wasn’t a surprise to Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce officials. Rather, the uncertainty was only going to be by how much, as state leaders were predicting the pending achievement, noting the Census Bureau data from 2024 had the metro area at 496,375. At the Springfield Business Development Corp.’s annual meeting on March 4, Jeff Pinkerton with the Missouri Department of Economic Development said the Springfield MSA’s growth since 2010 at 14% is outpacing the southwest Missouri region’s 10% increase and the state’s 4% rise over the same period.

Jonas Arjes, the chamber’s senior vice president of economic development, said the population count marks a significant economic development threshold, he said.

“We will get more opportunities. We will get more looks,” Arjes added. “Those site selectors and companies that would not have looked below half a million, now we’re going to get a look.”

He noted some site selectors also conduct due diligence on factors beyond population, such as the labor pool, demographics and cost of living.

Census data noted births and deaths were relatively equal over the five-year period for the local MSA, so Arjes said it appeared net migration led to the population growth. The data reported migration at 24,748 people over the five years – a number that Ben Vickers, business development manager with the chamber, said is largely fed by Springfield’s college student population.

“That’s a huge advantage that not many communities can talk about,” Vickers said. “If a company were to move production or office workers here or anything along those lines and expand in Springfield, then they will have a future workforce as well. It’s not just that we have a high population.”

Retail is the one sector that Vickers said most often utilizes population counts when it comes to analyzing potential expansion sites. However, chamber officials declined to name any of those companies by name they may be pursuing or plan to revisit.

“When they’re looking at customer pools and those types of things, that metric specifically is used most of the time as a first filter,” he said. “That half a million mark, even though the number only jumped up by about 5,000, it puts us into a different category, and that matters quite a bit.”

Rapid growth
The 8.3% growth rate over the past five years in Christian County is hardly a surprise to Anna Evans, vice president of economic development organization Show Me Christian County. She said the county anticipates hitting the 100,000-population mark by the end of 2027.

Since 2000, Christian County has grown from 55,000 to over 96,000, a 75% increase, ranking it first in the state by a percentage basis, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Numerically, it ranks sixth in the state over that quarter-century period behind Greene County, which ranks fourth.

“Unfortunately, we don’t have a great tool to confidently identify where new Christian County residents are coming from,” she said via email. “Statewide, we are seeing minor positive domestic migration, meaning more people moving into Missouri than moving out. Anecdotally, we hear all the time from businesses who have customers or employees who have moved here from other states, especially California.”

Christian County’s rapid rate of population growth is a major factor for getting on developers’ radar, Evans said.

“The region is economically diverse and isn’t heavily reliant on one or two specific industries to prop up the entire economy, although health care, retail, manufacturing, accommodations and food service are standouts,” she said.

Seeking an opportunity for growth was an attractor to look at the Queen City around a decade ago for Austin, Texas-based Vital Farms Inc. (Nasdaq: VITL). The company opened its Springfield egg washing and packing plant, known as Egg Central Station, in 2017, doubling the size of the facility to 150,000 square feet in 2022, according to past SBJ reporting.

Mike O’Brien, director of plant operations at Egg Central Station, said via email that the expansion to Springfield was driven by the company’s desire to vertically integrate its supply chain by washing and packing its own eggs from its network of small farmers.

“(Springfield) checked every box for our long-term growth: its central U.S. location, proximity to several major highways connecting us to our customers and consumers, a supportive business climate and an outstanding workforce,” he said, adding it is in a region where conditions support year-round outdoor access for its hens and is within a day’s drive to its growing farm network.

“The same factors that drew us to Springfield still ring true today,” he said. “Springfield continues to stand out as a strong and growing hub for food manufacturing, with a workforce, infrastructure and collaborative spirit that are essential to supporting expanding operations.”

When Vital Farms came to Springfield in 2017, it locally employed around 50, O’Brien said. The workforce has since expanded to over 400 employees who support operations around the clock.

Vital Farms works in the manufacturing space, one of the largest employers in Greene County. Other large industries in the county include health care, retail and government, according to SBJ list research.

Challenges persist
Still, there are challenges for the Springfield metro to attract businesses or provide expansion opportunities, both Evans and Arjes said.

“In Christian County specifically, the lack of available sites and buildings for industrial or logistical uses is a big challenge for us,” Evans said. “Interest in sites for this type of usage are the most common call we get, and in many cases, these are businesses that are already here in some capacity.”

There’s also competition for developable land in the county to fit business needs because of the demand for residential growth, she said. In some cases, land values are driven up, making a potential initial investment more expensive.

In Springfield, City Manager David Cameron said at a March 30 City Council workshop that the city is looking at the possibility of what he labeled as Partnership Industrial Center 3 West and said a technical committee has been formed to evaluate potential industrial park sites. He said a total of 15 sites are being evaluated for land use, transportation, utilities, environment and fire service.

Demand for housing is needed to be met better across the MSA, Arjes said.

“We need housing at all levels,” he said. “I’ve said this for quite a while, that the communities that figure out housing are going to have a distinct competitive advantage when it comes to labor force availability and talent pipeline for decades ahead.”

As a longtime employee in the residential real estate market, Tyler Bussell, president of Nixa-based Bussell Building Inc., said demand is outpacing supply. He estimated the company, which built around 140 homes in the local MSA last year, annually sells about 90%-95% of the inventory it builds.

“That tells me that there’s very strong demand,” he said, adding he doesn’t see that situation changing as long as the job market remains healthy and Springfield stays an affordable place to live. “I’m biased, but I don’t feel that there’s enough construction.”

According to Census Bureau data, building permits for housing units authorized in the Springfield MSA were down in 2025. A total of 1,768 permits were issued, with 1,426 of those for single-unit homes, a 20% drop from 2024’s total of 2,228 permits.

Even with pricing where it is currently, along with mortgage interest rates hovering around 6%, Bussell said not enough homes are being built to meet demand.

The average sale price for homes in the Greater Springfield Board of Realtors coverage area, comprising Greene, Christian and Webster counties, was $316,768 for February, according to the organization’s website. That’s a 4.1% increase from February 2025’s average of $304,251.

Evans said while residential growth comes with incredible opportunities in the long term, it also presents infrastructure challenges in the short term. Among the seven communities Show Me Christian County serves, which includes Billings, Nixa, Ozark and Sparta, she said all of them have at least one significant infrastructure need.

“We have wastewater systems and utility infrastructure implemented decades ago that are all reaching the end of their useful lives at relatively the same time,” she said. “Our big challenge is increasing the daytime population of Christian County and retaining the sales tax generation that would then help fund the repair and maintenance of these systems.