We Analyzed 37,738 Catholic Businesses. Here's What the Data Reveals About the Catholic Economy.
The largest dataset of Catholic-owned businesses ever assembled reveals surprising patterns about where Catholic commerce thrives, and where it doesn't.
Discover Catholic Business has spent over a year building the most comprehensive directory of Catholic-owned businesses in the United States. The dataset now contains 37,738 businesses across 23 categories, spanning all 50 states.
Nobody else has this data. There is no government registry of Catholic businesses. No census question about the faith of business owners. This directory was built one listing at a time, through scraping, sourcing, manual verification, and community submissions.
When we published our first data report at 16,463 businesses, we thought we had a solid picture. We were wrong. The picture at 37,738 is dramatically different, and more revealing.
The 5 Headline Findings
1. Florida and Texas now dominate, and Michigan is close behind.
| Rank | State | Businesses | % of Total | |------|-------|-----------|-----------| | 1 | Florida | 3,812 | 10.1% | | 2 | Texas | 3,643 | 9.7% | | 3 | Michigan | 3,028 | 8.0% | | 4 | Pennsylvania | 2,441 | 6.5% | | 5 | Ohio | 1,932 | 5.1% | | 6 | Illinois | 1,758 | 4.7% | | 7 | Louisiana | 1,554 | 4.1% | | 8 | Indiana | 1,498 | 4.0% | | 9 | California | 1,252 | 3.3% | | 10 | New York | 921 | 2.4% |
When we had 16,463 listings, Michigan led by a wide margin. As the directory has grown to 37,738, Florida and Texas have taken the top two spots, reflecting both Catholic immigration from Latin America and the general population shift to the Sun Belt. Michigan remains a powerhouse at #3.
The surprise? Pennsylvania at #4 with 2,441 businesses. Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Scranton, historically Catholic cities with deep Irish, Italian, and Polish roots, have shown up in the data in a major way.
2. Healthcare has surged past home services.
The top 10 categories tell the story. Healthcare leads with 4,892 businesses, followed by Home Services (4,111), Finance & Insurance (3,375), Education (3,290), and Real Estate (2,790). Rounding out the top 10: Fitness & Health (2,117), Funeral Services (1,964), Gifts & Religious Goods (1,578), Legal Services (1,466), and Professional Services (1,119).
In our last report, home services led. Now healthcare has taken the top spot with 4,892 businesses, doctors, dentists, therapists, optometrists, and specialists serving Catholic communities. This is the most significant shift in the data: as the directory grows, the Catholic healthcare economy reveals itself to be larger than most people assumed.
Home services remains enormous at 4,111 businesses. But healthcare's rise to #1 tells us something important: Catholic professionals are not just tradespeople. They are doctors, nurses, and clinicians, the kind of white-collar professionals who do not always identify publicly as Catholic business owners.
3. The top 15 cities account for a massive share.
| City | Businesses | |------|-----------| | Chicago, IL | 515 | | Houston, TX | 422 | | Omaha, NE | 385 | | San Antonio, TX | 332 | | Pittsburgh, PA | 305 | | Cincinnati, OH | 271 | | Louisville, KY | 263 | | Dallas, TX | 237 | | Miami, FL | 234 | | Fort Wayne, IN | 233 | | Indianapolis, IN | 222 | | Milwaukee, WI | 218 | | Jacksonville, FL | 214 | | Tampa, FL | 212 | | Wichita, KS | 204 |
Chicago leads all cities with 515 Catholic businesses, finally asserting its position as the largest Catholic city in the Midwest. Houston (422) and the Omaha surprise (385) round out the top 3. San Antonio, which led our earlier dataset, now sits at #4 but remains the most Catholic-dense city per capita.
The Omaha anomaly deserves attention. Nebraska is not a state people associate with Catholic economic power, but Omaha alone has 385 Catholic businesses, driven by the Archdiocese of Omaha, Creighton University, and a deep Czech and Irish Catholic heritage that predates statehood.
4. Some categories remain vanishingly small.
At the other end of the spectrum: Pets (44), Monastic Goods (28), Apparel (114), Books & Publishing (134), and Church Supply (163).
44 pet businesses in the entire directory. 28 monastic enterprises (though those 28 include some of the most compelling stories in the dataset). 114 apparel companies, suggesting a wide-open market for Catholic-owned clothing brands.
These gaps are not weaknesses. They are opportunities. Every underrepresented category is a market where a Catholic entrepreneur could build with less competition and a built-in community of potential customers.
5. The Midwest-Sun Belt axis is real.
The data now reveals a clear geographic pattern: Catholic commerce concentrates along a Midwest-to-Sun Belt axis running from Michigan through Indiana and Ohio, down through Texas and Florida.
This axis contains 8 of the top 10 states and 10 of the top 15 cities. It tracks with two forces: (1) historic Catholic immigration to the industrial Midwest in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and (2) modern Catholic migration to the Sun Belt states.
Louisiana remains the outlier, 1,554 businesses from a state with just 4.6 million people. Catholic business density per capita in Louisiana is unmatched. The Cajun Catholic culture of Lafayette, New Orleans, and Metairie creates a Catholic economic ecosystem that larger states struggle to replicate.
What Changed Since 16,463
The growth from 16,463 to 37,738 businesses was not random. It reflects expanded data collection in specific areas:
| Metric | Feb 2025 | Mar 2026 | Change | |--------|----------|----------|--------| | Total businesses | 16,463 | 37,738 | +129% | | Categories | 23 | 23 | No change | | #1 State | Michigan | Florida | Shift | | #1 City | San Antonio | Chicago | Shift | | #1 Category | Home Services | Healthcare | Shift | | States represented | 50 | 50 | No change |
The shifts at the top, Florida over Michigan, Chicago over San Antonio, healthcare over home services, are not corrections. They are discoveries. As the directory grows, it reveals the true shape of the Catholic economy that was always there, invisible until someone mapped it.
What This Data Means
This is a snapshot, not a census. The directory grows every week as new businesses are submitted and discovered. But even as a snapshot, it reveals something that cannot be disputed:
Catholic economic life in America is real, measurable, and far larger than most people assume.
37,738 businesses is not a niche. It is an economy. It is nearly 40,000 businesses whose owners share a faith, often serve the same communities, and in most cases have never been connected to each other in any systematic way.
The question is whether Catholic consumers will support this economy intentionally, or whether it will continue to operate invisibly, each business on its own, unconnected to the broader Catholic community it could serve.
That is what the Discover Catholic Business directory exists to change.
Explore the Full Directory
The directory has continued to grow since this analysis. All 46,000+ Catholic businesses are searchable at discovercatholicbusiness.com, browse by category to explore sectors like healthcare, home services, and finance, or browse by state to find Catholic businesses near you.
If you are a Catholic business owner, list your business free and add your data point to the map. Every new listing makes the picture clearer, and makes it easier for Catholic families to find you.
For deeper analysis by category and city, explore our companion reports on Catholic home services, Catholic funeral homes, and city guides for San Antonio, Fort Wayne, and Grand Rapids.
Methodology: Data reflects the Discover Catholic Business directory as of March 2026. Businesses are included based on Catholic ownership, affiliation, or significant service to the Catholic community. Location data is parsed from self-reported business addresses. The directory is not a statistical sample, it is an ongoing census effort.
Sources: Discover Catholic Business, internal directory analysis as of March 2026
Social Repurposing Notes:
Caption: We analyzed 37,738 Catholic-owned businesses across all 50 states and 23 categories. Florida leads (3,812), healthcare is the biggest category (4,892), and Chicago has the most Catholic businesses of any city (515). Here's what the data reveals about the Catholic economy.