PRINCETON -- Riff Raff Arts Collective in Princeton hosted nearly 50 people for a summit Thursday.

Mercer County is striving to build a new economy with the help of a company called Create West Virginia.

Jeff James, Chairman of Create West Virginia's Creative Communities team spoke to the crowd about how Princeton can thrive in a new economy.

Everyone met to learn what it's going to take to develop, retain and attract the talented creative class required for this new economic growth. James referred to these kinds of people as intellectual property, saying that this group is growing at higher rate than traditional industries such as manufacturing and mining.

And he said these jobs are paying salaries as high as double the service industry jobs.

Business owners and artists that have already started working in downtown Princeton say they've seen the progress in it's beginning stages.

Now they're working to get more people interested.