It doesn't occur to a lot of people, but you can mostly use Shire Silver in your retail operations just like you do cash, with a few small differences.

The Cash Register

We suggest that you place our cards in the same slots as you would dollar bills of a similar value, on top of the paper money. For example, you might put your half gram silver cards on top of all your $1 bills, and twentieth gram gold cards would be good on top of $5 bills. That way your cashiers will be visibly reminded they are there, but they won't be in the way.

At the beginning of the day you might want to check our MSRP and write the current values down on a piece of paper by the register. If you have one of our "accepted here" stickers, you might consider jotting down the values on that using a dry erase marker or a grease pencil.

Our newest card designs have a denomination specific QR code on the back, so if you have a smart phone handy you should be able to use the Silver Calculator app to quickly get the dollar value of each card. In the near future you should be able to replace your cash register with just the smart phone!

Very simply though, when a customer hands your cashier some Shire Silver cards, they should just place them in the appropriate slots the same as they would dollar bills. Its that easy.

Making Additional Profit

You will want to make sure you have a merchant account so you can buy cards at a discount. Then when you hand them out as change you'll be slightly increasing your profit on that sale. Be sure to instruct your cashiers to ask customers if they'd like their change in Shire Silver.

It would be good if your cashiers become fully informed about sound money and can discuss it in detail with interested customers if they have time. But in most cases customers will be in a hurry or there'll be other customers waiting. In those cases its best to let it slide or hand them a brochure.

Acceptance Value?

We don't dictate that you must use our MSRP. We prefer it, and believe that it will help make it easier to use and be more widely accepted, but we would never force anyone to use our valuations.

If you don't want to use our MSRP, you'll need to come up with your own formula. Maybe you'll want to try spot price plus some percent. Whatever you decide, you'll want to document it in the store and on your businesses' listing on this site. That way your customers can easily find out and decide if they want to use it or not.

Getting Too Many Sales?

You might be concerned that customers could flood you with more Shire Silver than you're comfortable handling, or that you won't have enough paper dollars to pay suppliers that don't accept Shire Silver yet. We're not going to say "Don't worry at all", but we do think it won't be a problem.

The first reason we don't think it will be a problem is because there just isn't a whole lot of it out there yet. And while we're trying to grow as fast as we can, we're still new. Over time, as more and more people come on board, so will other businesses - including your suppliers most likely, so as the amount of business in Shire Silver you get grows, so will your ability to use them.

Also, we do have a buyback policy. Since we buy back at a lower price than you would get when using them with other businesses or by handing them out as change; we would hope you would try those outlets as well. You might consider asking your employees to take a portion of their salary or wages in Shire Silver. But if after all that you still need to convert some Shire Silver into dollars, just let us know and we'll make sure your needs are taken care of.

Accounting

As far as any accounting is concerned, you would just account for Shire Silver cards like you would an equivalent value of dollar bills. This is something many businesses are already familiar with, especially those that accept other currencies such as Canadian dollars or Euros.

Education

While it can certainly help if your cashiers are knowledgeable in sound money and Shire Silver, it really isn't necessary. People don't expect cashiers to be experts in everything, so if a customer asks them about it they can simply direct them to the website or hand them a brochure saying "I'm not an expert on it, but it is a legal alternative currency, and you can learn more about it here".

If your cashiers are curious, they will probably look into it for themselves. We don't suggest investing a lot of time in training them how to handle Shire Silver - it just isn't necessary.

Feedback

We'd love to hear about ways you use Shire Silver in your business. Are there better ways to promote it or to communicate its value to your customers? Let us know if you think this page can be improved, and if your idea is good enough we might just send you something of value as thanks.