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

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 West End maximize success.

What are the best businesses to open in West End?

The top businesses to open in West End include French Restaurant with a ~85% chance on average of surviving more than 2 years, best-case locations reaching ~86%, followed by Indonesian Restaurant and Russian Restaurant.

Is West End a good place to start a business?

West End is ranked number 16 across neighborhoods in and around Boston to start a business, with an average Survivability Score of ~78%. The highest-scoring business types in West End — at their optimal addresses — outperform the neighborhood average by ~2%.

What businesses are most in demand in West End?

Based on StreetSpring's 2026 survivability analysis, the most in-demand business types in West End are French Restaurants, Indonesian Restaurants, and Russian Restaurants.

How much money could a business in West End make?

Based on StreetSpring's 2026 analysis, selecting one of the best locations in West End could lead to making ~2% more than selecting an average location, and ~4% more than one of the worst locations.

Business Survivability in West End, Boston

Q: Does West End's income profile support new business openings?

West End's median household income (~$140K) is above the Boston metro median (~$135K) by approximately $5K. Income is close to the metro median, so business-type fit depends more on local demographics and competition.

StreetSpring's 2026 analysis finds that the best business to open in West End is a French Restaurant with a ~85% chance of surviving at least 2 years across the neighborhood on average.

April 24, 2026•17 min read

Quick Summary

Best business: a French Restaurant in West End (~85% average survival rate, ~86% at best locations)

Neighborhood rank: #16 across all neighborhoods in and around Boston

Neighborhood average: ~78% two-year survival across all business types

Rankings updated quarterly with latest market data

Detailed methodology

Last reviewed: May 4, 2026 by Bobby Koons, Founder & CEO, StreetSpring

In this article:

Summary
Is West End 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 West End is a French Restaurant with a ~85% chance of surviving at least 2 years across the neighborhood on average, with the best locations offering a ~86% chance; next is an Indonesian Restaurant with a ~84% chance, followed by a Russian Restaurant with a ~83% chance.

What does the data say about opening in West End?

**How West End compares:** West End's profile most resembles **Haymarket (Boston)** and **Rittenhouse (Philadelphia)** based on the demographic and density signatures we use to model location quality — all three share many nearby parks, many anchor tenants, and busier daytime population. Patterns from those neighborhoods are directly relevant for businesses evaluating West End.

**Failure pattern in West End.** Across the 93 business subtypes we track here, the strongest is **French Restaurant** at 85% average survivability — but the best and worst sites for this subtype within West End span **80% to 88%**, a 8-point gap. **The dominant failure mode in West End isn't subtype choice — it's site selection within the neighborhood.** Saturation context: Ukrainian Restaurants are the most-concentrated tracked subtype in the area, with 34 competitors within a 0.5-mile radius.

In Boston's neighborhood survivability rankings, West End comes in at #16, with an average Survivability Score of ~78% across all business types.

The highest-scoring business types in West End — at their optimal addresses — outperform the neighborhood average by ~2%.
Yet the same categories that score highest in West End can underperform significantly at the wrong address. Location precision within the neighborhood matters as much as choosing the neighborhood itself.
Commercial vacancy in West End sits at 14.4%, a figure that factors into survivability scores for every business type in this neighborhood.

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

Pinpointing the best locations within West End

StreetSpring narrows the decision down to the exact address — showing which blocks in West End produce the highest survivability scores for your concept. This is the address StreetSpring's 2026 analysis recommends most strongly for a French Restaurant in West End:

Reading visibility, frontage, and parking carefully

Loading live map preview...

StreetSpring's 2026 model identifies this area as the highest-survivability location for a French Restaurant in West End. Neighborhood-level averages are a starting point — the exact address will determine your actual survivability score. The model evaluates 100 factors — from primary and secondary competition to forecasted spend, mobility flows, and local market share potential.

Check if this location is still available →

What kinds of businesses thrive in West End?

#1-5: Highest Survivability in West End

French Restaurant — ~83%–~86% survivability range, with an average of ~85% across West End.
Opening an Indonesian Restaurant in West End shows ~84% average survivability. Top locations reach ~86%; lower-end sites show ~83%.
Russian Restaurant (Ranked #3): ~83% average in West End. Best-case storefronts: ~85%. Challenging locations: ~82%.
Music Store is ranked #4 for top businesses to open in West End: ~83% chance on average, best at ~86%, challenging at ~81%.
Syrian Restaurant — ~81%–~85% survivability range, with an average of ~83% across West End.

#6-10: Strong Performers in West End

Opening a Polish Restaurant in West End shows ~83% average survivability. Top locations reach ~84%; lower-end sites show ~81%.
Filipino Restaurant (Ranked #7): ~83% average in West End. Best-case storefronts: ~84%. Challenging locations: ~81%.
Veterinary Clinic is ranked #8 for top businesses to open in West End: ~83% chance on average, best at ~85%, challenging at ~80%.
Japanese / Sushi Restaurant — ~81%–~84% survivability range, with an average of ~83% across West End.
Opening an Armenian Restaurant in West End shows ~83% average survivability. Top locations reach ~84%; lower-end sites show ~80%.

Top 3 Compared Nationally

What you could earn opening a business in West End

Best location vs. average location

Based on StreetSpring's 2026 analysis, selecting a storefront that StreetSpring ranks in the top tier for your business type in West End could lead to you making ~2% more than if you selected an average location, and ~4% more than if you selected one of the worst locations.

How StreetSpring calculates location value

No two business types have identical location needs; survivability scores reflect these differences at the address level.
Nothing influences a business's future more than its location.
Maximizing your Survivability Score is the most reliable path to profitability.
StreetSpring analyzes your specific address against comparable businesses to forecast success.

What West End needs more of (per our model)

The top businesses to open next in West End:

French Restaurants — ~85% average survival rate, up to ~86% at best locations
Indonesian Restaurants — ~84% average survival rate
Russian Restaurants — ~83% average survival rate

Neighborhood-level averages are a starting point — the exact address will determine your actual survivability score. StreetSpring's accuracy is built on studying businesses that serve more than 180 million+ Americans across 24 cities. StreetSpring's model accounts for West End's 95.3% employment rate when projecting survivability — businesses reliant on discretionary spend benefit disproportionately in well-employed neighborhoods. StreetSpring updates survivability scores for available locations weekly — check the live tool now to see which storefronts in West End are currently available and how they score.

See the Survivability Score for your new business

Related Articles:

See the Boston Business Survivability Rankings
See the Boston Neighborhood Survivability Rankings

Frequently Asked Questions

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

What type of business should you rent your West End storefront to?

According to StreetSpring's 2026 data, the strongest tenant types for a storefront in West End are French Restaurants, Indonesian Restaurants, and Russian Restaurants.

Nothing influences a business's future more than its location.
StreetSpring analyzes your specific address against comparable businesses to forecast success. Landlords can use StreetSpring to match their exact address to the tenant types most likely to stay open and paying rent for 2+ years.

Should you rent your West End storefront to a French Restaurant?

Based on StreetSpring's 2026 analysis, a French Restaurant ranks as the top tenant type for your West End storefront — best-case locations show a ~86% survival rate, while the most challenging addresses drop to ~83%.

StreetSpring analyzes your specific address against comparable businesses to forecast success.

What should I consider when opening a business in West End?

Don't commit to a storefront in West End without first checking its Survivability Score — the difference between a 70% and a 90% score at two addresses on the same block can determine your long-term outcome.

Revenue Capture Score is what separates locations that look similar on the surface but produce dramatically different business outcomes.
No third-party scoring system produces these results — every prediction is generated by StreetSpring's own analytical models.
StreetSpring's live survivability scores are available for free — check your specific address now.

See the best place for your business at StreetSpring.

Real estate professionals and business owners across 24 major metros use StreetSpring to ground their site-selection decisions in data, not guesswork. Aggregated survivability rankings for Boston 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.
Outdoor seating / sidewalk use	Signing assuming you can add patio seating, then learning the city requires a separate sidewalk-cafe permit with long lead times.	Check the city's sidewalk-cafe permit process up front. Confirm landlord allows outdoor build-out in the lease language.
Permitted hours	Late-night or early-morning ops blocked by zoning, neighborhood association, or shared-wall restrictions.	Confirm the permitted hours-of-operation are in your lease AND in the local code. Pull recent variances or complaints from the zoning portal.

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

Visual Data

Bubble chart of business subtypes in Boston by survivability score and location density — Every business subtype in Boston plotted by score vs location count — bubble size shows market depth.

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

How we measure this: Most retail competition operates within a 500-meter radius — outside that, behavioral economics show customers don't routinely switch.

**A bit of history.** The West End is a neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, United States, bounded generally by Cambridge Street to the south, the Charles River to the west and northwest, North Washington Street on the north and northeast, and New Sudbury Street on the east. ([Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_End%2C_Boston))

**Worker-to-resident ratio (West End):** LEHD daytime population data gives West End a **1.7-to-1 worker/resident ratio** (a balanced mixed-use pattern). Median 1-mile workplace jobs: **11,372**; retail share within that: **859**. Worker-heavy neighborhoods skew demand toward weekday-business-hours; resident-heavy neighborhoods skew toward evenings and weekends.

Landmark anchor: Paul S. Russell, MD Museum of Medical History and Innovation sits in West End as a history-museum anchor — the kind of cultural draw that shapes weekend foot-traffic patterns nearby.

**Three local anchors for West End:** **4.7%** neighborhood unemployment (below the 24-metro median, ACS), **$1,631/week** average wage in the Boston area (above our metro median, BLS QCEW), and **2,338** new residential units permitted in Suffolk County in 2025 (Census BPS). These three together describe the demand-and-labor environment any new West End business operates within.

**BLS sector context:** Across the 11 industries StreetSpring tracks, 5-year survival rates from BLS Business Employment Dynamics, March 2025 release range from **47.8%** (Active Life — gyms, studios) to **61.8%** (Health & Medical). Restaurants — the largest single category in our corpus — average **50.0%** nationally, and retail averages **47.9%**.

Related Resources

Related:

Business Survivability in West End, Atlanta

Related:

Neighborhood-Specific Questions

Additional questions with answers drawn directly from local data sources.

What share of West End residents have a bachelor's degree or higher?

ACS data shows 84% of adults in West End with a bachelor's degree or higher, versus the metro median of 58%. A highly educated population tends to support specialty retail, premium services, and professional offices.

How many people live in West End?

ACS data estimates the West End resident population at roughly 6.8K. A smaller resident base means destination-pull or commuter capture matters more than walk-in traffic alone.

Does West End's income profile support new business openings?

West End's median household income (~~$140K) is above the Boston metro median (~~$135K) by approximately $5K. Income is close to the metro median, so business-type fit depends more on local demographics and competition.