About Grand Rapids

Welcome to Grand Rapids… A city with the warmth and charm of a small town but with big city amenities!

Grand Rapids is Michigan’s second largest city with more than one million residents in the metro area, offering a little something for everyone. Grand Rapids is made up of many distinct neighborhoods and is the perfect place to call home!

Downtown Grand Rapids is the financial and cultural anchor of Michigan’s West Coast. Once known as the Furniture Capitol of the World, downtown is where Grand Rapids’ has seen drastic change over the last couple of decades. Grand Rapids is almost reinventing itself moving from manufacturing into a more diversified economy. Michigan Street Hill, also known as Medical Mile, is the center of Grand Rapids’ growing biotech industry. Spectrum Health, Michigan State University’s Secchia Center Medical School, the Cook-DeVos Center for Health Sciences, and the Van Andel Research Institute are some of the current research and development facilities, with more on the horizon. Total investment in the so-called Life Sciences Corridor is approaching $1 billion in the past ten years. This rapid growth has and will create thousands of jobs for the region. Van Andel Arena and the Devos Place Convention Center have helped attract convention business to downtown.

Three Fortune 500 companies are headquartered in Grand Rapids – Universal Forest Products, Spartan Stores, and Steelcase, the latter carrying on a tradition of quality furniture making. Other notable local companies incluse Bissel Inc, Meijer, Metro Health, and Wolverine Worldwide. Also within the county is Alticor, the parent of Amway. Approximately a dozen colleges and universities are located in the Grand Rapids area including Grand Valley State, Aquinas College, Calvin College, and Grand Rapids Community College.