What Inc.’s fastest-growing Midwest companies list says about growth

Earlier this week, Inc. released their 2026 Midwest list of Fastest Growing Companies. The publication ranked 144 companies across 12 Midwestern states based on percentage revenue growth from 2022 to 2024. To qualify, companies had to be privately held, for-profit, independent, and generate revenue of at least $100,000 in 2022 revenue and at least $1 million in 2024. This isn’t a list of the region’s biggest companies, best-known startups, or most venture-backed firms. Instead it is a filtered look at companies that have managed to put up sharp revenue growth -above all else - over the time in question.

Even with those caveats, the list is revealing. 

The Midwest cohort added 8,171 jobs and $5.2 billion to the regional economy, according to Inc., while posting a median growth rate of 69 percent. And the mix of companies near the top also says something useful about our region right now: the growth stories are not confined to a single sector, funding model, or a certain type of entrepreneur. The No. 1 company, CrossLink Media of Carterville, Illinois, posted 1,091 percent two-year growth and connects businesses with mobile consumers through mobile marketing campaigns; Cleveland-based Marketing AI Institute, a platform to educate marketers about AI was No. 2 with 804 percent; No. 3 was Cloud Accountant Staffing, which goes without saying is an accountant staffing company and achieved 667 percent growth; and a smidge behind at No. 4 was Groomie Club, an e-commerce shaving business for bald men which achieved 638 percent growth..

In other words, the top few growing businesses in the region are not classic SaaS companies at all, but businesses that seem to have caught early waves of customer needs and executed on them.

Further down the list, the range gets wider. Indianapolis-based Authenticx ranked No. 31. The company, founded in 2018, analyzes voice, chat and email data for healthcare organizations. Founder Amy Brown noted the importance of her solution in the company’s own announcement saying, "Every conversation is a signal, and for too long, healthcare hasn’t really had a good way to act on them … This recognition reflects the urgency and momentum behind that shift.""

Cleveland-based CHAMP Titles (which raised $55 million earlier this year), meanwhile, is building software for digital vehicle title, registration and lien systems. The company came in 13th in the list with 329% growth, a reminder that one of the Midwest’s stronger recurring patterns is not consumer apps or flashy frontier tech, but companies modernizing old, ugly, expensive infrastructure.

There are also companies on the list that do not fit the usual “Midwest innovation” stereotype at all. CONQUERing, based in Milford, Ohio, ranked No. 21 and describes itself as an interchangeable fidget jewelry brand. MarketBeat, a financial news blog based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, ranked No. 58; the company said it posted 88 percent revenue growth from 2022 to 2024 and generated $50 million in top-line revenue in 2025. Express Wash Concepts, out of the Columbus area, ranked No. 88 with 59 percent two-year growth and said it now operates more than 135 car wash locations across several markets and a similar business - Tommy’s Express from Holland, Michigan - ranked No. 83.

Illinois dominated by count, with 47 of the 144 companies in the Midwest regional list, or just under a third of the full list. Ohio followed with 21, then Minnesota with 16, Michigan with 14 and Indiana with 13. Missouri and Wisconsin each had nine, Nebraska had six, and Iowa, Kansas and South Dakota had three apiece..

But count is only one lens. On state average growth figures, Iowa led at 177 percent although with only three entries this is skewed somewhat. Ohio followed with 174 percent average growth across its 21 entries with Indiana next at 163 percent. Missouri came in at 144 percent, Minnesota at 127 percent and Illinois at 120 percent. Michigan, by contrast, posted the lowest average growth rate in the attached figures at 71 percent despite having 14 companies on the list. 

All of which adds up to Illinois looking like the region’s volume play: a large, deep bench producing far more ranked companies than anyone else. Ohio is a more balanced story: plenty of companies and very strong average growth. Indiana is leaner but still sharp. Iowa’s result is an outlier that may be a statistical anomaly. 

So what can you take from this list, dear reader? Probably not that the Midwest has suddenly cracked some magic formula. Rankings built on percentage growth over a two-year span are useful, but they reward companies coming off smaller bases, and do not tell us much on their own about margins, durability, investment outcomes or eventual exits. Inc’s own methodology makes clear this is a revenue-growth list, not a complete picture of business quality.

Still, lists like this are good for one thing: they show where momentum is accumulating. This year’s Midwest ranking suggests that momentum is spread across more states and more business models than you could assume. Some will turn out to be blips. But taken together, they make a simpler point: we are not short on growing companies.