- Jackie Nguyen, 35, was living in New York City but landed in Kansas City, Missouri, in 2020.
- Nguyen, who'd been on Broadway, chose to stay after COVID lockdowns ended and opened a coffee shop.
I actually ended up in Kansas City because of the pandemic. I wasn't planning on coming.
I was born and raised in San Diego, lived in LA for a year, and then lived in New York for 10 years. I always thought I'd be in one of the big coastal cities.
I was doing a tour of "Miss Saigon" at the time, and the pandemic shut down my show. My partner, who was also in the show, was from Kansas City. So we came here temporarily to wait out the pandemic.
I got here in July 2020, and by July 2021 I knew I was going to stay.
It took a while for theater to come back. When New York started opening, I had to make a decision: Do I want to go back to NY? Do I want to go back to LA? But I really felt like Kansas City was popping off.
I'm now 35, so I was just coming out of the end of my 20s. I started to readjust my expectations of what I need from a city. There's just so much more opportunity for people who want to not be a small fish anymore.
Now I feel like I'm a big fish in a small pond. I've never experienced that before. It's cheaper here, and I have a better quality of life.
That's what I want millennials to know. There are huge opportunities in these smaller secondary cities that I didn't even know of, until I was accidentally here because of the pandemic.
I run my own business and have much cheaper rent
It is half as expensive to live in Kansas City.
In New York, I paid $2,100 for a small one-bedroom apartment in Astoria. Another time, I paid $1,000 for a railroad apartment — but my bedroom was the living room. I paid $2,300 for a one-bedroom in Long Island City. In Los Angeles, I paid $1,100 for one room in a three-bedroom in the Van Nuys neighborhood.
Right now, in Kansas City, I pay $900 for a two-bedroom apartment. I have parking, a whole basement, a front patio, a back porch, and an in-unit washer and dryer. And I'm in a great neighborhood. It's called Columbus Park, and I'm right next to the river and 10 minutes from downtown.
In New York, I was working, like, five jobs. I was a barista in the morning. I went to audition and to take a class. And then I would cater and babysit at night. Now, my life is a little slower, but I'm able to still apply my hustle.
I started a coffee-shop truck in 2020, and we opened a brick-and-mortar location in 2022 — the first Vietnamese coffee shop here in Kansas City. Because of that, we've become a hub for the AAPI community in Kansas City. We do all the Heritage Month activities; we do all the Lunar New Year activities and the Autumn Moon Festival activities for the city.
There's a lot more small-business support. There's a more communal feeling. You don't feel like you're just lost in a large crowd. Since people have a slower lifestyle, they are able to focus more on making friends and hanging out with friends. Community is such a big part of how my business has been successful.
LA and New York, for me, just felt like being on the hamster wheel. Obviously, I needed to be in New York for theater. People go to big cities because of the opportunity, right? But I don't think they understand there's also opportunity in other cities.
I want to tell other millennials: Don't live in fear of the unknown. If you feel lost on the hamster wheel, you can get off. Take a chance on these other smaller places — you might end up really surprised.