St. Pete Brewing is one of several new businesses in downtown St. Petersburg. The brewery’s owner, Tom Williams, hopes to open his doors in the next few weeks.

"Since they changed the laws last year allowing breweries to come in, it's been kind of a land grab,” said Williams. “Now, there's four breweries in St. Pete proper open. So, it's an exciting time. It's kind of the wild west.”

Chris Steinocher, president of the St. Petersburg Chamber of Commerce, is excited about the new businesses but says they present a new challenge. He wants to make sure venues like St. Pete Brewing have a local customer base for years to come.

"This is becoming a destination again,” said Mr. Steinocher. “But what you need to sustain that is you need a wide range of jobs and economic opportunities for everybody."

At their last meeting, City Council approved $30,000 for Mr.Steinocher to make a plan to lure more jobs to the area. Private businesses will pick up the majority of the tab.

The Chamber is using the money to hire Market Street Services, a consulting firm, to help create a plan to bring economic opportunities in St.Petersburg.

"By the end of that six month process we should have a pretty good sense of our brand, pretty good sense of the targets of who we're trying to attract,” said Mr. Steinocher. “And a great sense of whose going to do it and how much do we budget."

Market Street Services helped cities like Austin, Texas and Nashville, Tennessee achieve the same plans. ValPak President, Michael Vivio has seen their work first hand and is excited to help bring it to St. Petersburg.

"It's a retention tool and an attraction tool for getting the best talent to come work at ValPak,” said Mr. Vivio. “Every business has the same challenges. When I was in Austin, I worked with the same firm that St. Pete has hired and they built out a plan and they built out an organized way to go after that. That really made a difference and I think it'll make the same difference here."

Tom Williams is also optimistic about the future.

"I'm very bullish on St. Petersburg in terms of living here. It's the best city, I think in the country,” he said.

It is that mindset that the Chamber is counting on to attract big business with the new plan.

Mr. Steinocher said the Chamber wants to make sure the job growth extends to all parts of St. Petersburg including Midtown and St. Petersburg.