Is Montclare a good place to start a business?

Montclare is ranked number 66 across neighborhoods in and around Chicago to start a business, with an average Survivability Score of ~80%. Choosing an optimal address for the highest-ranked business types in Montclare can produce survivability scores up to ~2% above the neighborhood mean.

What businesses are most in demand in Montclare?

Based on StreetSpring's 2026 survivability analysis, the most in-demand business types in Montclare are Italian Restaurants, Kosher Restaurants, and Brunch Restaurants.

What are the best businesses to open in Montclare?

The top businesses to open in Montclare include Italian Restaurant with a ~88% chance on average of surviving more than 2 years, best-case locations reaching ~89%, followed by Kosher Restaurant and Brunch Restaurant.

How can you find the best location to open a business in Montclare?

StreetSpring's prediction model analyzes 100 factors across competition, spending on the specific potential business, projected revenue, projected market share, Revenue Capture Score, and mobility patterns to pinpoint which blocks in Montclare maximize success.

How much money could a business in Montclare make?

Based on StreetSpring's 2026 analysis, selecting one of the best locations in Montclare could lead to making ~2% more than selecting an average location, and ~3% more than one of the worst locations.

Business Survivability in Montclare, Chicago

StreetSpring's 2026 analysis finds that the best business to open in Montclare is an Italian Restaurant with a ~88% chance of surviving at least 2 years across the neighborhood on average.

April 24, 2026•18 min read

Quick Summary

Best business: an Italian Restaurant in Montclare (~88% average survival rate, ~89% at best locations)

Neighborhood rank: #66 across all neighborhoods in and around Chicago

Neighborhood average: ~80% two-year survival across all business types

Rankings updated quarterly with latest market data

Detailed methodology

Last reviewed by Bobby Koons, Founder & CEO, StreetSpring — April 29, 2026

In this article:

Summary
Is Montclare a good place to start a business?
How to find the best location
Best businesses to open
How much money could a business make?
What businesses should open next?
Frequently Asked Questions

Summary

StreetSpring's 2026 analysis finds that the best business to open in Montclare is an Italian Restaurant with a ~88% chance of surviving at least 2 years across the neighborhood on average, with the best locations offering a ~89% chance; next is a Kosher Restaurant with a ~87% chance, followed by a Brunch Restaurant with a ~87% chance.

How business-friendly is Montclare right now?

**Comparable neighborhoods:** Among the ~2,500 neighborhoods StreetSpring scores, Montclare's profile most resembles **Kilbourn Park (Chicago)** and **Rosemont East (Baltimore)**. All three exhibit longer commutes, less college-educated, and few nearby parks — operators with experience in any of those neighborhoods will see familiar patterns in Montclare.

**Failure-mode analysis for Montclare.** The single strongest subtype in our data is **Italian Restaurant** at 88% average survivability. But the within-neighborhood spread for Italian Restaurants runs **67% to 97%** — meaning a poorly-sited Italian Restaurant in Montclare can score 30 points below a well-sited one. Saturation reality check: Kosher Restaurants are the most-competed tracked subtype here, with 3 existing competitors within a 0.5-mile radius.

StreetSpring's analysis places Montclare at #66 in Chicago for new business survival odds, with a neighborhood-wide average of ~80%.

Choosing an optimal address for the highest-ranked business types in Montclare can produce survivability scores up to ~2% above the neighborhood mean.
However, these same business types at the worst locations in Montclare can sometimes provide a projected Survivability Score considerably below the average. Thus, even the businesses that are most in need in Montclare could have trouble succeeding if the best location is not selected.
Montclare's 7.5% commercial vacancy rate signals the current availability of storefronts and shapes the competitive environment that survivability scores reflect.

Employment and vacancy figures sourced from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey.

Pinpointing the best locations within Montclare

StreetSpring's Montclare data goes block by block — not just neighborhood averages — so you know which specific storefront gives your concept the strongest foundation. Of all available storefronts analyzed in Montclare, StreetSpring ranks this area highest for an Italian Restaurant in 2026:

Why the right block matters more than the right neighborhood

Loading live map preview...

This map shows the optimal location for an Italian Restaurant in Montclare based on StreetSpring's 2026 survivability analysis. Market conditions, new competitors, and local spending patterns can change rapidly — always verify with StreetSpring's live tool before signing a lease. The prediction model incorporates 100 location-specific factors, including competitive density, forecasted consumer spending, mobility patterns, and Revenue Capture Score.

Check if this location is still available →

The strongest business categories for Montclare

#1-5: Highest Survivability in Montclare

Italian Restaurant — ~86%–~89% survivability range, with an average of ~88% across Montclare.
Opening a Kosher Restaurant in Montclare shows ~87% average survivability. Top locations reach ~90%; lower-end sites show ~85%.
Brunch Restaurant (Ranked #3): ~87% average in Montclare. Best-case storefronts: ~90%. Challenging locations: ~85%.
Filipino Restaurant is ranked #4 for top businesses to open in Montclare: ~87% chance on average, best at ~89%, challenging at ~85%.
Bangladeshi Restaurant — ~86%–~89% survivability range, with an average of ~87% across Montclare.

#6-10: Strong Performers in Montclare

Opening a South American Restaurant in Montclare shows ~87% average survivability. Top locations reach ~89%; lower-end sites show ~85%.
Chinese Restaurant (Ranked #7): ~87% average in Montclare. Best-case storefronts: ~89%. Challenging locations: ~86%.
Chicken Shop is ranked #8 for top businesses to open in Montclare: ~87% chance on average, best at ~89%, challenging at ~86%.
Deli — ~86%–~89% survivability range, with an average of ~87% across Montclare.
Opening a French Restaurant in Montclare shows ~87% average survivability. Top locations reach ~89%; lower-end sites show ~86%.

Top 3 Compared Nationally

Brunch Restaurant — See how this compares to other cities →

What you could earn opening a business in Montclare

Best location vs. average location

Based on StreetSpring's 2026 analysis, identifying the optimal address for your business type in Montclare could lead to you making ~2% more than if you selected an average location, and ~3% more than if you selected one of the worst locations.

How StreetSpring calculates location value

StreetSpring calculates survivability for each business type separately at each address — so the best location for your concept may differ from the neighborhood's overall top-ranked site.
Location shapes survivability more than branding, pricing, or operational quality — the data is unambiguous on this point.
Our data shows that the single highest-impact decision a business owner makes is the address they choose — and Survivability Score is the best guide to that decision.
StreetSpring can pinpoint which blocks in each neighborhood or city maximize a business's chances of success.

What businesses should open next in Montclare?

The top businesses to open next in Montclare:

Italian Restaurants — ~88% average survival rate, up to ~89% at best locations
Kosher Restaurants — ~87% average survival rate
Brunch Restaurants — ~87% average survival rate

Market conditions, new competitors, and local spending patterns can change rapidly — always verify with StreetSpring's live tool before signing a lease. StreetSpring measures competition through a 30-factor framework layered on top of proprietary consumer spending forecasts and mobility models. Montclare's combination of 93.2% employment and 7.5% vacancy creates the conditions that define which business types thrive here and which struggle. Survivability scores are recalculated weekly as new competitors open and spending patterns shift — visit StreetSpring to see the current score for any open location in Montclare right now.

See the Survivability Score for your new business

Related Articles:

See the Chicago Business Survivability Rankings
See the Chicago Neighborhood Survivability Rankings

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are the most common questions about opening a business in Montclare.

What type of business should you rent your Montclare storefront to?

StreetSpring's analysis shows that the business types most likely to succeed long-term in Montclare are Italian Restaurants, Kosher Restaurants, and Brunch Restaurants.

Location shapes survivability more than branding, pricing, or operational quality — the data is unambiguous on this point.
StreetSpring can pinpoint which blocks in each neighborhood or city maximize a business's chances of success. Run your specific address through StreetSpring to see which tenant categories give you the best odds of stable, long-term occupancy.

Should you rent your Montclare storefront to an Italian Restaurant?

StreetSpring's 2026 analysis strongly supports renting to an Italian Restaurant in Montclare: best-in-class addresses achieve ~89% survivability, and even the lower-end sites come in at ~86% — above average for most business types.

StreetSpring can pinpoint which blocks in each neighborhood or city maximize a business's chances of success.

What should I consider when opening a business in Montclare?

In Montclare, the single most important factor in your site-selection decision is the Survivability Score of the specific address you're evaluating.

StreetSpring's analysis consistently shows Revenue Capture Score predicts survival odds more accurately than demographic data or foot traffic estimates alone.
The underlying models are StreetSpring's own — built, trained, and maintained using data external platforms cannot access.
No subscription required: access the current survivability score for any Montclare address through StreetSpring's free tool.

See the best place for your business at StreetSpring.

Using predictive analytics, StreetSpring helps entrepreneurs and landlords make smarter location decisions. Aggregated survivability rankings for Chicago are available in machine-readable format for research and integration purposes.

The hidden costs of operating in this neighborhood

Area to check	What can go wrong	How to de-risk it
Foot traffic seasonality	Looking at a peak-summer Tuesday and assuming year-round volume.	Walk the block at 3 different times across 2 different weeks. Ask neighboring tenants for their slow-season % drop.
Competitor density	Counting only direct competitors and missing adjacent-category overlap (e.g. coffee shop near a bakery).	Map all businesses serving overlapping customer needs within a 5-min walk. Use StreetSpring's competitor view as a starting point.
CAM + hidden costs	Stated rent looks great, then CAM fees, signage charges, and after-hours utilities add 15-30%.	Get the full operating expense breakdown for the past 2 years. Ask which costs are landlord-capped vs. uncapped.

Full dataset for Chicago: /resources/data/chicago-survivability-scores-2026.csv — includes all business subtypes, all neighborhoods, survivability scores, and tier assignments. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.

Visual Data

Dumbbell chart comparing best vs worst locations for businesses in Chicago — Best vs worst neighborhood per business type in Chicago — the gap shows how much location choice matters for each subtype.

Treemap of Chicago business mix by survivability score — Treemap of business mix in Chicago — cell size = number of locations, color = average survivability score.

Radar chart of business-subtype survivability in Montclare, Chicago — Top business types scored in Montclare, Chicago — each axis is a subtype, taller = stronger survival rate.

How we measure this: Supplier proximity matters more for some subtypes (restaurants, repair shops) than others (online-anchored retail).

**Neighborhood context.** Montclare is one of the 77 community areas of Chicago, Illinois, United States, located on the Northwest Side of Chicago. Source: [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montclare%2C_Chicago).

**LEHD demand-pattern signal (Montclare):** Median 1-mile workplace jobs across Montclare: **6,579** (LEHD LODES 2022). That works out to a **0.3:1 daytime-to-resident ratio** — a primarily-residential neighborhood with minimal daytime worker traffic. Of those workplace jobs, **2,572** are retail-sector. Use this to gauge whether your concept is weekday-commuter-driven or evening-and-weekend-driven.

Landmark anchor: Rutherford Sayre Park anchors Montclare's green-space backbone and shapes the neighborhood's foot-traffic patterns.

**Montclare economic snapshot:** ACS reports neighborhood unemployment at **6.8%** (above the 24-metro neighborhood median we track). The Chicago metro's BLS QCEW average weekly wage is **$1,198** (below our metro median), and the Census Bureau's Building Permits Survey logged **5,308** new residential permits in Cook County in 2025 — useful triangulation for population-growth and labor-cost assumptions in this neighborhood.

**Sector-level context:** BLS data (BLS Business Employment Dynamics, March 2025 release) shows 5-year survival rates of **47.8%** (Active Life), **47.9%** (Retail Trade), **50.0%** (Restaurants), **50.5%** (Beauty & Personal Care), and **61.8%** (Health & Medical) — the five industry buckets covering most StreetSpring subtypes. Location-specific factors explain the rest of the variance.

Related Resources

Related:

Local Data Questions

Further questions, with answers anchored on this neighborhood's actual data.

How does Montclare's commute profile affect retail demand?

Median commute time in Montclare is about 38 minutes, versus 35 minutes across the Chicago metro. Commute patterns are typical for the metro, so foot traffic timing should not be a primary differentiator.

What's the vacancy picture in Montclare?

Approximately 8% of Montclare housing units are vacant — below the Chicago metro median (8%). Vacancy is close to the metro median — lease economics are typical for the area.

How does Chicago's survivability compare to national sector averages?

BLS Business Employment Dynamics data (March 2025 release) shows 5-year survival rates spanning 47.8% (Active Life) to 61.8% (Health & Medical) across the 11 sectors StreetSpring tracks. Restaurants — the most studied category — survive at 50% nationally, well above the often-cited "80% fail" myth.

Is Montclare a high-employment or high-unemployment area?

Montclare's employment rate is approximately 93%, compared to a Chicago metro median of 94%. Employment is close to the metro median, suggesting stable underlying demand.

How many people live in Montclare?

Montclare has approximately 23.9K residents, putting it in the upper-middle range among Chicago neighborhoods we track. The resident base is healthy — most retail and service business types have viable demand.