Cash is King: How Using Cash Can Help Laurens County Businesses Thrive

Shop Local Series, Part 7

We hear a lot these days about shopping local, but one powerful way to amplify your impact on small businesses in Laurens County is often overlooked: paying with cash. In an age of tap-to-pay convenience and digital wallets, it’s easy to forget the ripple effect that credit card and transaction fees have on local businesses. But those small percentages—usually around 3% per transaction—add up to major monthly costs for small business owners.

One Bill, Many Benefits

Let’s break it down. Imagine you have a $50 bill in your wallet. You take your family to a local restaurant and pay with that $50. The restaurant owner then uses that same bill to pay the local laundry service. The laundry owner uses it to pay the barber. The barber then uses it to buy groceries from a local market. That same $50 keeps circulating in full, fueling multiple local businesses, paying local workers, and staying right here in Laurens County. The bank doesn’t touch it. No fees. No skimming. Just community helping community.

When Digital Takes a Cut

Now imagine the same $50 paid digitally. If you pay for that same meal with a card, the restaurant is charged around 3% in fees—about $1.50. The laundry, barber, and market owners will all lose 3% of their transaction amounts too. After 30 such transactions, the value of the original $50 drops to around $5, and $45 has gone to card processing companies and banks. Now multiply that loss across a full month of business. If a small retailer does $20,000 in monthly sales, and 90% of those are paid by card, they’re paying around $540 per month in processing fees—or over $6,000 per year. That’s money that could be used to pay part-time help, buy new equipment, cover rising utility costs, or simply help a local family make ends meet.

Give Local Businesses a Boost

Small businesses already face thin margins. Rent, utilities, payroll, insurance, and supplies all chip away at their bottom line. When customers choose cash—even just a few times a week—it can make a noticeable difference. Cash sales allow local businesses to keep more of what they earn. This doesn’t mean abandoning digital payments entirely. But making an intentional effort to use cash for small, routine purchases—coffee, lunch, haircuts, gifts—helps local businesses hang onto more of your support.

Simple Steps You Can Take

So what can you do? Withdraw small amounts of cash each week to use for day-to-day local purchases. Use cash at small, independently owned businesses, especially where you know margins are tight. Spread the word—many people don’t realize how much processing fees eat into local business income. And respect businesses that offer cash discounts—it’s not about avoiding taxes, it’s about surviving.

Keep It Here at Home

Paying with cash isn’t just an old-school habit—it’s a tangible way to help the businesses we love keep more of what they earn. In Laurens County, those businesses are our neighbors, our family members, and our friends. Next time you stop by your favorite local restaurant, boutique, or barber, consider skipping the swipe and handing over a few bills instead.

It’s a small gesture that keeps more money where it belongs—right here at home.