Forget the appeal of half-price homes or the great outdoors. Colorado’s tech community launched a campaign Monday to tell Silicon Valley and Bay Area tech workers — and companies — that Denver has a thriving technology ecosystem with plenty of good jobs.
Pivot to Colorado, a $500,000 effort supported by state agencies and at least nine tech companies, doesn’t hide its goal to recruit tech talent to fill openings in a state with one of the lowest unemployment rates in the nation. The site says it clearly, “This is a poaching strategy.” Using billboard ads and digital marketing, the message is aimed at those who want to “really make a difference” and join a tech hub that “grows through community rather than competition,” according to its website.
The state’s economic development office, which is a member, says that Colorado has 11,000 tech companies. But other than citing “lower cost of living,” there’s no mention that Denver’s median home price, while it has been climbing rapidly, remains 60 percent less than San Jose, Calif. — $407,100 vs. $1.1 million, according to February prices tracked by Zillow.
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Charter members include email developer SendGrid, shopping app Ibotta, payroll firm Gusto, cybersecurity’s Ping Identity, accounting’s Xero, digital signage firm Four Winds Interactive, home services’ HomeAdvisor, health tech’s Healthgrades and enterprise software’s Workday.
“The goal is to hire two to three individuals by each company over the course of the initial campaign,” said Alison Meadows, chief people officer at Ibotta, a now-500 person company that added 100 new employees in the past year and is still hiring. “Companies are not offering up anything extra other than highlighting the added benefits of working in Colorado. We have very competitive salaries based on the cost of living in Denver.”
