In fact, the viability of the barter industry and the benefits of membership in a trade exchange have been reported by such authorities as The Wall Street Journal, Kiplinger’s, CBS News, Marketing Concepts, Opportunity magazine, Family Circle, and Good Housekeeping.

Here’s how joining the Merchants Barter Exchange can benefit your company:

* Generate new business. Your company will be exposed to thousands of new business contacts across the U.S. eager to spend their Trade Dollars.
* Conserve your cash. Purchase the goods and services your company needs with Trade Dollars instead of cash.
* Clear out excess time, inventory, and capacity. Trade what you have too much of for the things you don’t have enough of.

You can also use Trade Dollars as welcome employee bonuses or supplements to regular salaries. And you may even be able to use Trade Dollars to pay bills, negotiate purchases with non-member companies, or clear up past-due accounts receivable.

We think you’ll come to agree with our thousands of member companies that today, barter really is a smarter way to help build your business.

ENJOY!

Elsewhere in the world, bartering is as commonplace as accepting credit cards, and an integral element to almost every business model. Here in the US , predominantly due to the fact we have been the strongest and most affluent global economy for so long, barter was never a necessity. Until now, that is. With the current collapse of the monetary infrastructure here in America and around the world, increasing numbers of people are flocking to the age-old system of bartering. At the turn of the new millennium, countries like Argentina , who were on the brink of bankruptcy, were forced to revert back to bartering in order to ‘reboot’ their cash economy. Employers were forced to pay their workers with products instead of money, which they then took to large, communal warehouses and bartered their wares with other workers. Hopefully this will not be the plight of the US , and this article aims to highlight some solutions that are already in place and are laying the foundations for a working alternative economy.

Bartering in its simplest definition is the exchange of goods and services for other goods and services without the need for cash. It makes sound economic sense, because a business owner can trade out things at their wholesale (their cost of goods) for things they would have to pay the full cash price for otherwise. If you are a restaurant owner, why wouldn’t you trade $100 worth of gift certificates with the company that does your pest control each month? Or if you own a repair garage, if you can get uniforms for your mechanics and trade out oil changes and services, you’d be daft not to. The benefits are not just improved cash flow and better efficiencies, it’s also a great way to get new customers. Many people are told during their occupational schooling – especially Chiropractors and massage therapists – to barter for many of their start-up needs to conserve their seed capital, because their cost of goods is so much lower than the retail cash price.

But how do you find other business owners to barter with you, or what if you want their stuff and they don’t want yours? Even though bartering makes perfect sense to any business, the simple fact is that most owners don’t have the time or resources to call twenty or more companies to find a partner to trade with, and when profits are up, it’s faster and more convenient just to pay cash. Barter for the most part just happens by accident; two owners meet, they start talking, and decide to swap – much like you might have traded baseball cards in the school yard as a kid. Organized barter companies arose in the mid-50s to address just this problem.

In the early days, the technology to work a little barter company was simple: a phone and a rolodex. As time passed and technology improved, slightly more advanced barter organizations emerged, but merely adapted a similar system of a printed member list and put the bulk of the trading upon the members. By default of this system being cumbersome, organized barter never seemed to get past second base, especially with the advent of payment by charge and credit cards. In America today there are over 1,000 barter companies of varying sizes, from small local collectives of less than 50 members, to national corporations like ITEX and Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE). Non-profit organziations like IRTA (International Reciprocal Trade Association) and NATE (National Association of Trade Exchanges) have attempted to consolidate and uniform bartering via small exchanges, but due to the fact that each barter company does things in slightly different ways with different fees, and most accepting cash as part of the payment it is not a perfect system to manage.

To date, the only national barter company to totally reinvent organized barter is Merchants Barter Exchange. Because they do things so differently to all the other exchanges out there, they do not belong to either IRTA or NATE, as MBE does not allow its members to inflate prices, nor do they allow any part of the exchange to be paid in cash, which makes them the only ‘true’ barter company in the US today. In fact, MBE has made bartering similar to spending cash within a private bank or economy, which accounts for their incredible growth since their inception in 2000.

The downward economy and the improvements in technology have given rise to many ‘me-too’ barter firms that are solely internet-based looking to cash in on this lucrative industry. A quick Google search will bring up a torrent of ‘new age’ online barter clubs. On closer examination, be wary of the jumble in the internet jungle. Start-up costs for an online ‘portal’ – as most of the online-only barter clubs are – are much lower than a bricks-and-mortar barter company and the majority are merely a swap-exchange. A serious business owner needs to look towards a business-focused barter company that has new, rather than used, goods, and services that are suitable to his business.

Other important factors to consider when scouting a good barter company are the membership fees. If a barter exchange does not charge fees, chances are they are not worth joining. Any business service that has benefits to membership should feel totally justified charging a sign-up fee and fees for using the system. Usually it is the brand new start-up exchanges that have to waive initiation fees because they have no members, or the older barter companies that cannot iron out the flaws of inflated pricing and cash-barter blends.

Obviously, back in the 50s when organized bartering began, Uncle Sam wasn’t too concerned with barter, but obviously where there is money to be made, the IRS eventually get interested and wants its share. So too with the barter industry. Back in 1982, Congress passed the barter tax compliance provisions in the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act. This landmark legislation acknowledged and equated barter exchanges with banks and credit card companies as “third party record keepers” of the financial records of other taxpayers. The IRS considers all forms of barter – whether direct or via a barter exchange – just the same as cash transactions, and all barter companies have to issue 1099b forms at the end of each tax year to members for accounting purposes.

Like any business decision, choosing the right barter company for you should be made carefully. Most good barter exchanges have active outside sales representatives that are qualified to answer most questions a business owner has. Consider the fees to join, the availability of goods and services, most importantly today, with increased competition and shrinking market share, make sure the exchange does not list you on an open directory so that your existing cash business is protected (there is nothing worse than having your top five cash-paying clients join the same barter group as you because they saw you on the list and then you lose that cash income!) There are pros and cons to privately owned and publicly traded companies too, obviously a privately owned exchange is not effected by the stock market fluctuations and less likely to go under.

Again, these are very tough and challenging times for all of us, business owners and employees alike. Barter as an economic vehicle has most certainly stood the test of time and will be around for many more millennia. Done right, barter can be an incredible boost to any business.

Bartering has long since been a highly effective means to trade out goods and services for other products and services one needs, and although cash has made commerce much easier, when cash is tight, smart business owners revert back to the age-old method of bartering. Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE), as the only national company that insists on 100%-barter at the same cash price, is helping many restaurants around the US save thousands of dollars during these tough economic times. Below are some examples of how an average-sized restaurant can shave many hundreds of dollars each month from their bottom line expenses.

The benefits of using MBE-barter for a restaurant are obvious, since they carry their standard overhead (rent, utilities, salaries, phone, etc.) anyway, no matter how many customers they have, the only variable to revenue and expense is the number of customers that eat at the establishment. For MBE to bring just one extra table of guests per night that spends $50 (tipping the wait staff in cash), what does it actually cost the restaurant owner? Their only additional cash outlay is the cost of the food and drinks consumed (which is usually less than 25%) and, realistically, since they are not buying that food especially for those customers, it probably isn’t even noticeable on the P&L.

What if, instead of paying cash for their monthly pest control service, they used MBE-barter? If they traditionally paid $100 for the service, they could now get the very same quality service via MBE for $100 barter dollars (costing them only 25 cents on the dollar – their food cost – plus a 10% purchasing fee – another $10.) In this scenario they have saved a total of $65 in cash on one service that month.

Now let’s imagine they need their carpets dry cleaned, and the cost is usually $300. By bartering the service out, they would save $195. Most restaurants need landscaping, let’s add that to our scenario, say previously a $250 outlay. Now they save another $162.50. Perhaps they need to do some advertising and would usually spend $2000, now they have saved $1300. As you can see, it is easy to make quite considerable savings each and every month by joining and utilizing the easy barter payment system of Merchants Barter Exchange. Just on these five items alone, this particular restaurant has saved a total of $1722.50 in cash in one month.

On top of the cash savings, which are important, let’s not forget the other major benefit: more customers. Since MBE ensures that they only bring new business to their members, this example could have introduced upwards of 5 – 10 new customers to that restaurant. Just imagine what additional cash customers that can create via word-of-mouth advertising. All in all, bartering is a very effective method for any restaurant of any size to make significant savings across the board. The best thing of all, MBE takes care of all the paperwork and tax reporting needed for the end of year.

For instance your typical month-to-month fixed expenses that could be covered on trade would include: office rent, paging and answering service, janitorial service, accounting/bookkeeping, equipment purchase and rental, maintenance contracts (building and office equipment), landscape maintenance, security system, coffee service, bottled water, payroll services, secretarial service, pest control, message-on-hold service, to name a few.

Periodic expenses that can be obtained on trade include: travel expenses (accommodations, meals), staff incentives/bonuses (vacations, restaurant scrip, entertainment, event tickets), printing, graphics, advertising and promotion, computer programming and repairs, financial planning, medical reimbursement plans, carpet cleaning, building repairs (roofing, painting), parking lot repairs, customer gifts, auto repairs, banners, signs, flags, and products for your personal needs.

Every time you acquire any of these goods or services without spending cash, you increase your cash flow…a critical factor in business. Using barter instead of cash makes it easier to operate…and removes a lot of the day-to-day pressure.

Ask anyone who’s operating a successful company and they’ll tell you there are only two critical factors to running a business. First, you must price your product so you make a profit. But sales and receivables aren’t enough. Secondly, you must continually generate a lot of “on-going” cash (keep the cash flowing), so you can pay your bills and other obligations in a timely manner.

They do so through formal organizations known as barter networks or trade exchanges. (A trade exchange acts as a clearinghouse to match buyers and sellers, and also as a bank to track each transaction.)

The federal government gave trade exchanges the “stamp-of-approval” through the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982, which recognized them as third-party record keepers of financial information, the same as banks and stockbrokers.

Why are so many companies happy, even eager, to trade? Because they have a surplus of goods and services, and a shortage of cash—just like you. Plus they need what you have! For many, it’s the only way they can easily generate substantial additional business.

Through our nation’s trade exchanges it’s possible to gain exposure to tens of thousands of potential clients. And many times, you’ll find the by-product of all this new barter business (because everyone you deal with has friends and business associates) is cash referral business…a great side benefit!

Huge future sales are waiting for you. Possible, because as a member of a trade exchange you get free advertising in monthly statement stuffers (your company’s fliers are sent to every member). Plus we also offer a free, weekly e-mail and broadcast fax-service as well. These e-mails and faxes always announce the latest cruises and other travel accommodations available to exchange members, in addition to other listings.

The bottom line, when you are a member of a trade exchange, is that you can purchase almost anything you want without paying cash. You pay for your purchases with the promise to provide your products or services at full retail value. These new sales are the proven way to build your customer base, and solidly expand your operation in these times of tumultuous economic change.

Just take a look at what some companies are doing:

Syrup For Advertising
Barq’s, a Louisiana manufacturer of root beer, had a great product, but little recognition outside of their regional market. That was before they doubled their ad budget, and increased sales, by trading root beer for advertising. Their efforts were so successful that Coca-Cola recently bought them out.

Empty Rooms For Exposure & Name Recognition
Howard Johnson Franchise Systems traded 120,000 room nights, or 5% of their capacity, in return for advertising. Since their average hotel has a 65-67% occupancy, they always had some vacant rooms… and their only trading cost was “changing the sheets.” Such barter financing of advertising is an inexpensive way to build name recognition, because of the hotelier’s low marginal cost structure.

Cooperative Barter Effort Brings P.R. Coup
Brazil’s Tourism Board concluded a $40 million deal with an American corporate barter company for a public relations and advertising effort in the U.S. to encourage tourism in Brazil. Rio de Janiero’s hotel-keepers’ association participated in the transaction, as the bulk of their trade would be bartered hotel rooms.

Trading Space (Empty Seats) For 9,000 New Uniforms
Australian-based Qantas airlines recently adopted a major barter acquisition program and promptly traded airline tickets (empty seats) for 9,000 new uniforms.

Unsold Time For Equity In Emerging Growth Companies
Recently, ABC-TV formed a new unit with the express purpose of bartering its unsold time to new, young, emerging, growth companies in exchange for 5% to 20% equity stakes (stock ownership as payment for their TV time). ABC, knowing that the second-hand on the clock never stops, has adopted the profit-making mantra, “We must trade our unsold time or lose it, forever.”

As we’ve seen during down economies in the past, growth in usage of the “barter” section of craigslist is accelerating, up more than 100% in the last year alone:

Bartering has long since been a highly effective means to trade out goods and services for other needed products and services, and although cash has made commerce much easier, when money is tight, smart business owners revert back to the age-old method of bartering. Throughout history there are many stories of doctors trading with other local merchants for things they need. Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE), as the only national company that insists on 100%-barter at the same cash price, is helping many medical establishments around the US save thousands of dollars during these tough economic times. Below are some examples of how a doctor’s practice can shave many hundreds of dollars each month from their bottom line expenses.

Often people overlook the hundreds of thousands of dollars a doctor has invested in their education, their equipment, and their offices before they even start to reap the rewards of all their hard work. A doctor’s office starts in the red and has to build into a profitable establishment over many years. The benefits of using MBE-barter for doctors are obvious, since they carry their standard overhead (rent, utilities, salaries, phone, etc., on top of their education bill!) anyway, no matter how many patients they have, the only variable to revenue and expense is the number of patients that they can see. For MBE to bring just one new patient that spends $2500 on medical fees a year, what does it actually cost the doctor? Their only additional cash outlay is the cost of the treatment (which, if it’s just an examination, is practically zero, and certainly less than 10%.) If there are additional cash expenses for procedures, in order to cover the large overhead, it is definitely less than 50% of the fees, and probably isn’t noticeable on the P&L.

On the other hand, if a doctor has three hours of empty appointments, how much revenue are they losing? In addition to that, unlike accepting health insurance, there are no delays or discounts in payment for services. What if, instead of paying cash for office cleaning, they used MBE-barter? If they traditionally paid $100 for the service, they could now get the very same quality service via MBE for $100 barter dollars (costing them only 10 – 50 cents on the dollar – their core cost – plus a 10% purchasing fee – another $10.) In this scenario they have saved a total of $80 – $40 in cash on one service that month.

Now let’s imagine they need their lab coats dry cleaned, and the cost is usually $200 per month. By bartering the service out, they would save $160 – $80. Perhaps they need new carpet, let’s add that to our scenario, say previously a $2500 cash outlay. Now they save another $1000 – $2000. Perhaps they need to do some advertising and would usually spend $4000, now they have saved $1600 – $3200. As you can see, it is easy to make quite considerable savings each and every month by joining and utilizing the easy barter payment system of Merchants Barter Exchange. Just on these few items alone, the doctor’s office saves thousands in cash by trading instead.

On top of the cash savings, which are important, let’s not forget the other major benefit: more patients. Since MBE ensures that they only bring new business to their members, this example could have introduced upwards of 5 – 10 new patients to that practice. Just imagine what additional cash customers that can create via word-of-mouth advertising. All in all, bartering is a very effective method for any doctor’s office of any size to make significant savings across the board and grow their practice. The best thing of all, MBE takes care of all the paperwork and tax reporting needed for the end of year. With MBE-barter already in place helping thousands of business owners, perhaps the government needs to slow down on their proposed next round of spending and actually look at all options available to improve the fantastic healthcare coverage we already have in America?

It is a slow day in the East Texas town of  Madisonville.

It is raining, and the little town looks  totally deserted. Times are tough, everybody is in debt and everybody lives on credit.

On this particular day a rich tourist from the  East is driving through town.

He enters the only hotel in the sleepy town and lays a hundred dollar bill on the desk stating he wants to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one to spend the night.

As soon as the man walks up the stairs, the hotel proprietor takes the hundred dollar bill and runs next door to pay his debt to the butcher.

The butcher takes the $100 and runs down the  street to pay his debt to the pig farmer. The pig farmer then takes the $100 and heads off to pay his debt to the supplier of feed and fuel.

The guy at the Farmer’s Co-op takes the $100  and runs to pay his debt to the local prostitute, who has also been facing hard times and has lately had to offer her “services” on credit.

The hooker runs to the hotel and pays off her debt with the $100 to the hotel proprietor,  paying for the rooms that she had rented when she brought clients to that establishment.

The hotel proprietor then lays the $100 bill back on the counter so the rich traveler will not suspect  anything.

At that moment the traveler from the East walks back down the stairs, after inspecting the rooms.

He picks up the $100 bill and states that the  rooms are not satisfactory…… Pockets the  money and walks out the door and leaves town.

No one earned anything. However the whole town is now out of debt, and looks to the future with a lot of optimism.

And that ladies and gentlemen, is how the United  States Government is conducting business today.

If that doesn’t scare the hell out of you, then I don’t know what will.

—————————–

Through barter, we are able to help people make more money, while saving them money to pay off their debts.  As a small business owner, perhaps even the owner of that hotel, you could have paid your “debt” by giving another business owner a night in your unused hotel room.

Doesn’t that just make sense?  Using your unused capacity (unsold advertising space in a newspaper, or an empty seat on a bus) to pay your bills… You’re still providing value to the economy… shouldn’t you get credited for it?

The origin of barter [commodity-backed] money requires goes back to the beginning of trade in ancient societies, which started with temples and clay tablets in Mesopotamia and Egypt:

“Tax payments [by farmers] became standardised in terms of quantities of wheat or barley grain. These grain standards formed the basis for all the early money of account units, such as the mina, shekel, lira, and pound. Money, then originated not as a cost minimizing medium of exchange, but as the unit of account in which debts to the palace (tax liabilities) were measured. As the area over which taxes were imposed increased, palaces found it useful to farm out tax collections to private farmers. The first evidence of lending at interest comes from the practice of payment of taxes by the tax farmers, who then took bondservants and charged interest on the village debts. … The clay shubati (received) tablets record these and other debts. Each tablet indicated a quantity of grain, the word shubati, the name of the person by whom received, the date, and the seal of the receiver. The tablets were either stored in temples where they would be safe from tampering, or sealed in cases, which would have to be broken to get to the tablet. Unlike the tablets stored in temples, the case tablets could and did circulate. A debt could be cancelled and taxes paid by delivering a tablet recording another’s debt whereupon the case which recorded the cancelled debt could be broken to verify the debt terms. This was general practice for several thousand years …. In other words, taxes, debts, and price lists existed for thousands of years, with clay tablets circulating before anyone had the bright idea of reducing transactions costs by creating money through stamping precious metals to coins. … From the earliest times, markets operated on the basis of credits and debits, and even the smallest sales to consumers took place on credit, which could be carried on the books of the merchant for years before being cleared.” Wray, L. R. (2000)., Modern money, in: Smithin, J. (eds) What is Money?, London: Routledge International Studies in Money and Banking, pp. 43/44.

When we refer to the term “barter dollars” in today’s economy we actually refer to what has historically been known as “commodity-backed money” or “representative money”.

Bartering is coming of Age with the heavyweights like:Amoco,Goodyear,Caterpillar,3M,USX,Kmart and Pfizer. Marketers at Amoco saved the company’s parent, Standard Oil of Indiana, the cost of steel piping, thanks to a carefully planned barter. They supplied the latter with chemicals, which were traded to Goodyear for rubber belting materials and later disposed of in another barter. Amoco was paid for the chemicals with trade credits, which Amoco passed up to Standard Oil. It used them in a cashless deal for the pipes.

I’m not real smart, but if the big guys are bartering why wouldn’t everyone else barter?

Barter is nothing new – it’s been around since the dawn of Man – and I’m glad such an old and tried-and-tested method of doing business is actually getting its proper and fair share of the limelight in the local and national press. If one were to be totally honest, barter is the only stable part of our global economy. Look back to the economic collapse of Argentina in 2002. It took them going back to bartering to set their economy back on track. Seven years later over 500,000 people and businesses still hold strongly to barter, because they don’t trust their cash economy. Unfortunately many other western countries are teetering dangerously close to the Argentinean scenario.

That’s obviously good news for the barter industry, and especially for Merchants Barter Exchange (www.merchantsbarter.com) with their new form of trading: MBE-barter. Like the barter our cavemen ancestors participated in, organized barter is nothing new and actually dates back to the mid-1950s here in America. The challenge has always been controlling the flow of internal currency (usually referred to as “barter dollars”) and maintaining the integrity of the barter economy (not letting members inflate prices, or take part payment in cash, or in any other way tarnish the initial reputation of the membership.)

That’s where Merchants Barter Exchange and MBE-barter stands head and shoulders above practically all the other barter organizations out there today. Because of their internal systems and “checks and balances” procedures, you will never incur any of those bad practices when utilizing MBE-barter. In fact, any member caught trying to damage the integrity of the exchange is immediately expelled from the system, thus ensuring only the very highest quality standards in the industry. Unfortunately for their competition, the only way any existing barter exchange hindered by the old way of doing things can even begin to compete on the same level is to start from scratch – that puts them almost ten years behind Merchants Barter Exchange. That’s an impressive head-start and that keeps them ahead of the pack.

Additionally, through these higher quality standards and control systems, MBE-barter allows members to conduct much bigger trades than is even remotely possible with lesser exchanges. A few examples of trades possible via MBE-barter all at 100% (something no other barter company can promote) are $100,000 printing jobs, brand new forklifts, new home and office furniture, vehicles – the list is practically endless. Because everything is transacted at the same cash price and 100% bartered, there is no difference using MBE-barter for needed goods and services as using cash or credit, except for the obvious economic and marketing benefits a member gains.

Therefore, as an alternative to cash, MBE-barter is the best substitute by far, and actually has mechanisms in place to protect existing cash business. Obviously in this Internet-age, there are many web-based barter organizations emerging, however they have simply put a “modern” face on the flawed, old ways of doing barter, which cannot stamp out blending cash and barter for trades, cannot control pricing, cannot effectively co-ordinate member trades to keep the economy balanced and flowing with integrity. In short, they probably won’t last as long as their older companions, or grow to be more than a fleeting fad.

Existing Merchants Barter Exchange members are sitting pretty and patting themselves on the back for getting involved when they did. The good news for non-members, however, is that membership is very simple and the company is expanding incredibly rapidly around the US. Most likely they coming to a city and town near you within the next twelve months (that is, if they are not already strongly established in your town!) For a nominal, lifetime membership fee almost any business can join. The rest of the costs involved with membership are minimal and predominantly pay-per-use transaction fees on purchases made.

No article concerning commerce would be totally complete without at least a slight mention of Uncle Sam. The days of tax-free barter went out the window in the 1980s when barter companies gained the same standing (third-party record keepers) as banks and credit card companies. All barter revenue is considered the same as cash as far as the IRS is concerned and all barter companies must issue 1099b forms to all members for tax reporting purposes.

The economic outlook still looks very bleak (both nationally and globally) and no educated person remotely believes an about-turn any time soon is even a concept. Dumping trillions of dollars into the pot can lead to only two certainties: higher inflation and a tax burden being passed along somewhere. It’s good news for Merchants Barter Exchange and their members, not too promising for those dependent upon the cash world, though.

The origin of barter [commodity-backed] money requires goes back to the beginning of trade in ancient societies, which started with temples and clay tablets in Mesopotamia and Egypt:

“Tax payments [by farmers] became standardised in terms of quantities of wheat or barley grain. These grain standards formed the basis for all the early money of account units, such as the mina, shekel, lira, and pound. Money, then originated not as a cost minimizing medium of exchange, but as the unit of account in which debts to the palace (tax liabilities) were measured. As the area over which taxes were imposed increased, palaces found it useful to farm out tax collections to private farmers. The first evidence of lending at interest comes from the practice of payment of taxes by the tax farmers, who then took bondservants and charged interest on the village debts. … The clay shubati (received) tablets record these and other debts. Each tablet indicated a quantity of grain, the word shubati, the name of the person by whom received, the date, and the seal of the receiver. The tablets were either stored in temples where they would be safe from tampering, or sealed in cases, which would have to be broken to get to the tablet. Unlike the tablets stored in temples, the case tablets could and did circulate. A debt could be cancelled and taxes paid by delivering a tablet recording another’s debt whereupon the case which recorded the cancelled debt could be broken to verify the debt terms. This was general practice for several thousand years …. In other words, taxes, debts, and price lists existed for thousands of years, with clay tablets circulating before anyone had the bright idea of reducing transactions costs by creating money through stamping precious metals to coins. … From the earliest times, markets operated on the basis of credits and debits, and even the smallest sales to consumers took place on credit, which could be carried on the books of the merchant for years before being cleared.” Wray, L. R. (2000)., Modern money, in: Smithin, J. (eds) What is Money?, London: Routledge International Studies in Money and Banking, pp. 43/44.

When we refer to the term “barter dollars” in today’s economy we actually refer to what has historically been known as “commodity-backed money” or “representative money”.
Posted by Tram at 2:10 AM 1 comments
History of Money
In the Beginning: Barter
Barter is the exchange of resources or services for mutual advantage, and may date back to the beginning of humankind. Some would even argue that it’s not purely a human activity; plants and animals have been bartering—in symbiotic relationships—for millions of years. In any case, barter among humans certainly pre-dates the use of money. Today individuals, organizations, and governments still use, and often prefer, barter as a form of exchange of goods and services.

9,000—6,000 BC: Cattle
Cattle, which include anything from cows, to sheep, to camels, are the first and oldest form of money. With the advent of agriculture came the use of grain and other vegetable or plant products as a standard form of barter in many cultures.

1,200 BC: Cowrie Shells
The first use of cowries, the shell of a mollusc that was widely available in the shallow waters of the Pacific and Indian Oceans, was in China. Historically, many societies have used cowries as money, and even as recently as the middle of this century, cowries have been used in some parts of Africa. The cowrie is the most widely and longest used currency in history.

1,000 BC: First Metal Money and Coins
Bronze and Copper cowrie imitations were manufactured by China at the end of the Stone Age and could be considered some of the earliest forms of metal coins. Metal tool money, such as knife and spade monies, was also first used in China. These early metal monies developed into primitive versions of round coins. Chinese coins were made out of base metals, often containing holes so they could be put together like a chain.

500 BC: Modern Coinage
Outside of China, the first coins developed out of lumps of silver. They soon took the familar round form of today, and were stamped with various gods and emperors to mark their authenticity. These early coins first appeared in Lydia, which is part of present-day Turkey, but the techniques were quickly copied and further refined by the Greek, Persian, Macedonian, and later the Roman empires. Unlike Chinese coins which depended on base metals, these new coins were made from precious metals such as silver, bronze, and gold, which had more inherent value.

118 BC: Leather Money
Leather money was used in China in the form of one-foot-square pieces of white deerskin with colorful borders. This could be considered the first documented type of banknote.

800 – 900 AD: The Nose
The phrase “To pay through the nose” comes from Danes in Ireland, who slit the noses of those who were remiss in paying the Danish poll tax.

806 AD: Paper Currency
The first paper banknotes appeared in China. In all, China experienced over 500 years of early paper money, spanning from the ninth through the fifteenth century. Over this period, paper notes grew in production to the point that their value rapidly depreciated and inflation soared. Then beginning in 1455, the use of paper money in China disappeared for several hundred years. This was still many years before paper currency would reappear in Europe, and three centuries before it was considered common.

1500s: Potlach
“Potlach” comes from a Chinook Indian custom that existed in many North American Indian cultures. It is a ceremony where not only were gifts exchanged, but dances, feasts, and other public rituals were performed. In some instances potlach was a form of initiation into secret tribal societies. Because the exchange of gifts was so important in establishing a leader’s social rank, potlach often spiralled out of control as the gifts became progressively more lavish and tribes put on larger and grander feasts and celebrations in an attempt to out-do each other.

1535: Wampum
The earliest known use of wampum, which are strings of beads made from clam shells, was by North American Indians in 1535. Most likely, this monetary medium existed well before this date. The Indian word “wampum” means white, which was the color of the beads.

1816: The Gold Standard
Gold was officially made the standard of value in England in 1816. At this time, guidelines were made to allow for a non-inflationary production of standard banknotes which represented a certain amount of gold. Banknotes had been used in England and Europe for several hundred years before this time, but their worth had never been tied directly to gold. In the United States, the Gold Standard Act was officialy enacted in 1900, which helped lead to the establishment of a central bank.

1930: End of the Gold Standard
The massive Depression of the 1930′s, felt worldwide, marked the beginning of the end of the gold standard. In the United States, the gold standard was revised and the price of gold was devalued. This was the first step in ending the relationship altogether. The British and international gold standards soon ended as well, and the complexities of international monetary regulation began.

The Present:
Today, currency continues to change and develop, as evidenced by the new $100 US Ben Franklin bill.

The Future: Electronic Money
Digital cash in the form of bits and bytes will most likely become an important new currency of the future.

These days, though, Cressman sees bartering as a significant way to reduce cash outflow. Last fall he joined the Stroudsburg (Pa.) Merchants Barter Exchange, an association that coordinates and organizes trading of products and services among its more than 10,000 business members. In September, when the transmission blew on one of the firm’s trucks, Cressman turned to the exchange and bartered for a replacement. “That would have cost between $1,500 and $2,000, and that was not in my budget,” he says. He also bartered to acquire a $4,000 piece of stone-crushing equipment. “I probably wouldn’t have bought one this year,” he says. “It would have had too much of an impact on my cash flow.” But as a result of strategic bartering, Cressman estimates he has been able to save about $6,000 total so far this year.

In recent years, bartering has gained currency as a relatively easy path for small outfits to attain goods and services without having to dig into their coffers. It has also become a successful channel to attract new customers and expand one’s business. According to the most recent numbers compiled by the National Association of Trade Exchanges (NATE) in Mentor, Ohio, some 400 barter exchanges in the U.S. and Canada generate transactions worth $4 billion a year.
On the Upswing

And now, with banks cutting back on credit lines or shutting them down altogether, the use of barter has gained renewed momentum. Notably, Thailand, the world’s largest rice exporter, last month announced it planned to barter rice for oil from Iran, one of world’s top 10 rice importers. For small businesses, ramping up their own use of barter is a strategy that allows them to reserve cash and still expand operations at a time when credit lines have yet to thaw.

Tom McDowell, executive director of NATE, says he has seen a 10% to 12% increase in new clients joining organized barter exchanges. “Suddenly, [business owners] were running into different obstacles, and they started looking for other avenues for resources, not just credit,” he says. “The interesting thing that is happening in this economy is that businesses still have inventory and capacity. They still have expenses. What they don’t have is customers.”

Barter exchanges (BusinessWeek SmallBiz, 4/16/08) are fee-based membership groups. Typically, barter dollars are issued when a member performs a service or offers a product that can then be used to purchase goods or services of another member within the exchange. (The exchange receives a commission on the “purchase” side of the transaction.) Most exchanges work on a 50-50 cash-to-barter system, while others, such as Merchants Barter Exchange, operate as a 100% barter trade system. Most offer lines of credit that can be used to snap up a host of items, from carpet cleaning services to office supplies to large equipment.
A Way to Get Credit

Merchants’ founder, Steve Bolles, says membership in his eight-year-old exchange, which has offices in 30 states, has tripled this year. As the financial situation remains bleak, Merchants continues to ramp up clients. “Just 18 months ago, when we would go and talk to business owners about signing up, they would say, ‘We don’t need to talk to you.’ Now everybody gives us an appointment.” A strong inducement: “Everyone we sign up gets a line of credit right away,” Bolles says.

“Most people are looking to conserve cash,” says Ralph Sigler, who owns Carolina Packaging & Supply in Raleigh, N.C., and belongs to two different exchanges. “We started bartering about 12 years ago. The way we were growing, it made sense to substitute barter dollars for cash dollars.” Sigler says he bartered to obtain everything from security system installations to letterhead and envelopes. “I’ve saved anywhere from $20,000 to $25,000 a year by bartering, and I’ve also taken on a lot of new accounts.”

Bartering serves as another avenue to help keep businesses afloat. “I would say my bartering has gone up 20% in the past six months,” says Mike Cody, owner of Chip & Crack Windshield Repair in Garner, N.C. “At first I used it for hotel stays and gifts to employees.” Now he says he has begun to barter to obtain equipment for his business instead of having to spend cash. “If I were to make a guess, I’d say that I’ve saved over $1,000 this year.”

“Eventually we will see a shift in thinking,” says NATE’s McDowell. “What will happen is that people who were reluctant to use the credit line, or used it sparingly, will see the tremendous credit crunch and will look for new resources. They will find that they can use trade exchanges.”

Perman is a staff writer for BusinessWeek.com in New York.

Barter has become such a popular concept because it is a clear way to hold onto your cash while being able to purchase everyday items and accomplish everyday tasks by using credits earned within the company. Trading products or services with other barter members, within a company, attains these credits.
All types of services and products are available, especially with an enormous increase in the barter market over the past years. Companies available throughout the country offer such business-oriented items and services as web design, advertising and printing. Goods are also available for personal life including construction, medical and car repair. Businesses offering leisurely activities including golf courses, vacations or restaurants can also be utilized.

Advertising and publicity are other enormous factors when seeking the benefits of barter. For example, one nationwide barter company, Merchants Barter Exchange, works with brokers who send out emails each day and faxes once a week advertising one member. This allows members to see what is available and also gives each barter client pinpointed recognition. The exposure is given at no cost. Any business owner knows, on a regular basis, they will spend thousands to have their name heard by potential customers. With barter it’s done for free.

Small businesses enjoy being a part of barter companies because it helps them keep pace with larger competitors. With thousands of businesses trading on a regular basis, the chance of one barter member picking up from another is much more likely than the initial member choosing to use a non-barter customer and paying cash. This sends business from the larger companies, who do not belong to the group, to the barter members, creating a new set of clientele for the smaller business.

Becoming increasingly popular, the industry is looking forward to continued growth throughout the next year. Barter is now recognized as a business tool every company of every size should consider using to increase market share.

Barter is a resourceful process of transacting business without the use of cash. In organized barter, business members use what they have to buy what they need, with Merchants Barter Exchange serving as the marketing agency, facilitator and a third party record-keeper.

How can a trade exchange be a marketing agency? All the members of a trade exchange represent their particular business specialty. When an exchange member looks for a plumber for instance, they turn first to the trade exchange. The plumber has a built in confidence with other trade exchange members simply because they are members of the same trade exchange. They feel comfortable bartering with other business owners who also have the same mindset in succeeding in the business by utilizing barter.

Merchants Barter Exchange also keeps in regular contact with their members and have marking tools to get the word out to its members about new members and specials. No extra fees are involved to have your business highlighted. What a great way to barter for marketing.

Don’t lose out on adding new customers to your business. Join Merchants Barter Exchange today.

Your ability to leverage your buying power is the most important (in my humble opinion) reason for you to understand how to use barter in your daily business practice.

Let me give you some examples:

A massage therapist has at least 20:1 buying power with trade  (their only cost in the trade is approx. $2 per massage, which is the cost of their massage oil and some laundry soap for washing the sheets).

A restaurant averages 4:1 buying power (their only cost in the trade is approx. 25% food cost).

Hair Dressers average 10:1 buying power  (their only cost in the trade will average 10%).

Carpet Cleaners are about the same as a hair dresser.

Radio Stations and other advertising media are at about 20:1.

Printing businesses are approximately at 10:1 buying power.

…and the list goes on and on…

Any down-time in your business is a prime barter opportunity. If you have expenditures you should be thinking of ways to utilize barter instead of your already earned cash to pay for them.

A simple question I would recommend you get use to asking yourself;

If I could pay $10 for this service instead of $50, would it be worth bartering for?

Barter isn’t going to work every time, BUT, it will work enough of the time to save you thousand’s of dollars per year! All you have to do is”make it so”.

All of this while adding new customers to your business. Join Merchants Barter Exchange today. It’s a great way to leverage your costs as a business.

Many people who are trying to save some cash this holiday season, are turning to bartering web sites.

Some families here and across the country who are down on their luck, are finding help on Craigslist this holiday season in the form of bartering. It’s actually paying off for this one couple.

The Lavalle family used to live a comfortable life. But now, they’re going through a tough time. Richard got laid off and the family lost its house in New Mexico. They were forced to move and Richard works two jobs. They’ve sold many of their belongings, including Gina’s wedding band, and the kids toys in order to pay the bills and buy food.

The couple refuses to take handouts. So Gina turned to Craigslist, where her ad joined dozens of other ads from people wanting to barter services or other items for Christmas presents.

“I’ll split wood. I’ll babysit. I’ll clean house. My husband’s a mechanic. He’ll work on cars,” said Gina. “Last year they didn’t get a Christmas. So this year I’m trying my hardest to get them a Christmas.”

This is happening locally too. One parent wants a Playstation, Xbox, or Wii for his three children. Saying, he’s willing to barter a jetski, computer stuff, just about anything so that his kids can have a nice gift.

One person in Corfu wants to barter her portable electric keyboard for Smackdown 2010 for Playstation 2, the only thing her disabled son wants for Christmas.

One father in Niagara Falls says he has a lot of stuff to barter, to get his two kids something nice for Christmas. He’s offering up a Garmin GPS, 10,000 baseball and football cards his dad gave him, and even his work as a handyman. He says, he doesn’t want handouts as some are worse off than him.

Through Merchants Barter, the family wouldn’t have a need to go out seeking one on one trades, but would have an entire network of people to trade with. We’ve got over 10,000 members nationwide ready and willing to trade. Contact Us today to learn how we are able to help you get your Christmas by barter. It’s a lot easier than you’d think.

As they struggle to keep customers and pay the monthly bills, restaurants are swapping food for services like oven-hood cleaning and pest control.

Bartering helps restaurants fill seats, reassuring prospective customers who might be turned off by the sight of a vacant eatery. It also attracts new customers when tradespeople bring friends along, reduces some costs, and helps retain employees who can’t scoop tips off empty tables.

It’s hardly a permanent fix for ailing restaurants, which still need cash to cover such expenses as rent, mortgages, taxes and utilities. But bartering is an especially useful tool for independent restaurants that, unlike some chains, lack access to corporate credit lines or cash.

Many restaurants are using barter exchanges that track and manage the transactions, which count as taxable income and must be recorded for tax purposes. Rather than traditional bartering, in which services are swapped directly between vendors, most barter exchanges use a “round robin” approach that offers flexibility for both restaurants and service people. For example, a plumber uses trade credits accumulated at an exchange to pay for a restaurant meal. The restaurant owner can use the credits spent by the plumber to “purchase” a variety of services offered by appliance repairmen, electricians and other exchange clients. The exchange acts as a bank, keeping track of credits and collecting fees on each transaction.

Tony Romano, owner of Marcello’s Pasta Grill in Tempe, Ariz., where business is off 40% from three years ago, joined the Trade Exchange in October. Since joining the exchange, he says he’s been averaging $2,000 per week in trade credits from tradespeople, which has allowed him to pay for almost all of his monthly expenses—from laundry to fire-extinguisher maintenance—without writing a check.

Although the restaurant doesn’t receive cash for the food, the tradespeople usually tip well, Mr. Romano says, which keeps his wait staff happy.

He says his traffic has increased 10% in the last month. New exchange clients also have led to catering jobs. “A lot of small businesses can’t afford to take their employees out for a Christmas party, but they can barter it,” he says. “I’ve booked two lawyers’ offices and three dentists’ holiday parties.”

Restaurants like the Iberian Pig in Atlanta are swapping food for services.

Independent restaurants have fared slightly better in the last year than chain restaurants, though it’s hard to say how much bartering has helped. Same-store sales at independent restaurants declined 9% for the year ended Sept. 30, while same-store sales at chains declined 9.7% during that time, according to restaurant consulting firm Technomic Inc.

Sean Miller says he now has more than 30 restaurants involved in his exchange, up 20% from a year ago. The exchange charges a one-time $795 membership fee as well as a $15 monthly fee, and takes a 10% cut of each transaction from the person making the trade purchase.

Tradespeople also appear to be spending more when they go out to eat. A trade credit is worth a dollar; Mr. Miller says he used to see tradespeople buy restaurant credits in batches of 100 or 200; lately, he says people are buying restaurant trade credits worth $300 to $500 at a time.

Cody Smith, owner of Dynamic Pest Control in Mesa, Ariz., has been cashing in his trade credits at restaurants more frequently in the past six months. “It’s a great way to take the family out, enjoy a meal and walk away with very little cash out of your pocket.”

Trading his pest control services for restaurant meals and other services has brought in new clients and boosted his sales by 15% in the last year, due partly to new cash-paying clients who aren’t part of the exchange, Mr. Smith says.

Atlanta restaurateur Nancy Castellucci recently opened a fourth eatery called the Iberian Pig in an historic building that needed to be brought up to code. She used barter credits to cover 60% of the refurbishment costs.

“We would have had to go to the bank otherwise and we didn’t want to go to the bank. When you have barter dollars, it’s a much cheaper way to borrow money because you’re not actually borrowing money, you’re borrowing goods and services and not paying interest.”

Mr. Zampatti of the Atlanta exchange says he’s seeing restaurants increasingly use barter for routine maintenance costs. “In the past, restaurant owners would use barter to upgrade their lifestyle, like to go on vacation or buy jewelry, but because of the economy, now they’re using it to pay for their business expenses.”

Unlike other barter companies who display a member directory to the public, Merchants Barter protects the identity of the members until a trade is in the works, for the customer’s best interest. Firstly, MBE does not want to take away any cash paying customers from members. Imagine John from John’s Dry Cleaning has been a customer of Jack’s Hardware for years, always spending money when he walks into the hardware store. John is a member of MBE and sees Jack’s name on a member directory. Next time John uses Jack’s services, he hands him a barter check instead of cash as a form of payment. Now Jack has lost a cash-paying customer. MBE is designed to bring new clientele into a business by using barter and does not intend to turn cash paying customers into barter users.

A clever system is used in order for members to receive information on what is available within Merchants Barter. Each member is designed to a personal broker who, from day one, gets to know all about what the member offers and what that member is looking for. Each client will be given a list which itemizes the resources that MBE offers. The list gives members the opportunity to check off what interests them. From there, the broker will compare what the member wants to the clients that offer those specific items around the general area. Before any contact information is given, the broker will verify, with each party, what is intended to be traded and get the OK from both. If a member has specific wants that are not readily available within the company, the MBE sales team, which works directly with the brokers, will personally work to recruit companies that would serve these desires.
online trading, adobe acrobat 6.0 download free – Easy Adobe PDF creation, printable crossword puzzles

Brokers also work on advertising each member, without using specific names, by what they are offering through the barter system through daily emails and monthly brochures. These methods will publicize the products and services offered to keep other members updated on what is available to them within the exchange without directly stating names.

One of the most common fears a business owner may have about joining a barter exchange is the chance of trade price inflation. Other barter companies accept members inflating prices, to gain more barter credit than cash, or they allow members to trade using part barter credits and part cash. At MBE, there are strict rules when in comes to spending cash — it does not happen! MBE works with 100% trade 100% of the time with no inflation involved. Clients treat barter members the same as cash customers, this way cleints are actually reaping the benefits of not having to spend cash to purchase those necessary itmes.

MBE understands what members of the barter industry are looking for and the team dedicates its time to make sure the customer is satisfied.

Some folks wrongly believe barter to mean ‘haggling’ or negotiating for things. Others ignorantly believe bartering to be inferior is some strange way. Therefore, I thought I’d pen a few simple, ease-to-find words about what barter REALLY is. Additionally, just like words are easier to understand when used in a sentence, I thought I’d offer a few actually examples of bartering both in a business setting and for individuals.

According to The Free Dictionary definition, “Barter” is “To trade goods or services without the exchange of money.”Pretty simple enough. A cashless exchange of goods or services. Following are a few examples of cashless exchanges:

Mary is a vet, and she needs some dental work. Bill is a dentist with a very large dog. If Bill does some dentistry work for Mary, and she takes care of his dog in exchange, that would be an example of two business owners bartering.

Jonny and Jane are two school children. At lunchtime Jonny swaps (or trades) his apple for Jane’s yoghurt. This is a simple example of what children commonly do all the time: exchanging what they don’t want for what they do want.

Debbie needs some small landscaping done at her house, she doesn’t have much money, but she has a very nice sofa she doesn’t need. Coincidentally, Michael is a landscaper that needs a new couch. In this example, Debbie gives Michael her sofa in exchange for the landscaping.

In all three examples above it is a complete win-win scenario. Everybody gets what they want without using any money, instead they trade something they already have, but don’t really need. Barter is very simple, very effective, and unlike modern monetary systems has been proven to be highly successful over many thousands of years. For more information about bartering, check out the Business Barter Blog from Merchants Barter Exchange.

There’s nothing like a heart-attack to give you a wake up call that you have some ‘health issues’. The recent economic wake up call has come as a business heart attack for many.

I’ve been in business the whole ten years I’ve lived in the US (give or take a few months waiting for visas, etc.) and one common thread I noticed: most business owners know next to nothing about ‘business’! Yeah, you’re probably as astonished as I was. Now, understand what I mean by that, though. Most business owners are extremely good at what they do – they make good food, mow lawns well, etc. – but when it comes to actually UNDERSTANDING THEIR BUSINESS, they haven’t got a clue. This is all fine and dandy when the economy is booming and people are throwing around money, because they have it to freely spend. Any idiot can set up a business and make money in the good times! But what about right now?

So, what can these “flabby” firms do about their bad colesterol… weak hearts… and high blood pressure…?

1. Since you’re being squeezed by your customers, squeeze your vendors more. Ask for better terms from your suppliers.

2. Don’t just cut your prices to compete. This can be like a self-induced heart-attack. Dropping prices should be a total last resort, even if you have your margins sorted out. Instead, study the market, your competition, what are they doing and why? Don’t just copy them to compete. If you do discount, do it on the second half of the purchase – i.e., make them buy “more for less”; buy one, get 20% off the second, that sort of thing.

3. Use BARTER more. If you’re an idiot business owner that thinks you “only do business on a cash-basis”, then you are (actually, it’s true) a total idiot, and understand NOTHING about how business works (you’ve been warned, and I pray you have deep pockets, because you probably won’t last this recession!) Barter is not discounting, it’s not haggling, it is in fact as simple as moving stuff you already have but DON’T WANT or need in exchange for stuff you DO want. The best thing is, when you trade, it never costs you as much as paying with cash. If you still don’t understand how it works, do some online research.

4. Make improvements. Start with things that will have the most impact on your business and that will be free to do, or cost very little. If your shop front looks drab and nasty, invest $40 in a tin of paint and a brush, and while business is slow, repaint it. Encourage customer loyalty… bring a friend, get a bonus… that sort of thing! Ask your regulars to help you. You’ll be surprised how many of your customers are used to you always being there, let them know you appreciate them by asking for their help. 

5. Save Money Wherever You Can. I’ll start with the biggy first, if you have to let a member of staff go, you have to look to the long term goal of survival, perhaps they can go part time initially, or cope with a slight pay cut? Talk to your landlord, will he be flexible on your payments? If things are really tight, you should have cut out all luxuries a long time ago (this is everything that doesn’t bring in business as a direct result.) Basically, if it doesn’t have an ROI, is it necessary? And these cost savings apply equally to your personal/ home expenses as well as your businesses.

6. QUIT WHILE YOU’RE AHEAD. As harsh as this may sound, is it smarter to get out three months before you should have, or face the opposite problem of wishing you’d gotten out three months beforehand? As great a business person as you may think you are, if you realistically cannot see your company turning around, you may very likely be better off, salvaging what you can, closing the doors, taking the hit, regrouping, and making new plans for the next venture.

These are definately tough times for many – both in and out of business. It isn’t a time for despair, nor is it a time to lean on the government. We want less involvement from government, and an overall downsizing of beaurocracy (now that’s a fat whale that needs a serious Jenny Craig overhaul! and probably topic for another blog post!!) The strong will survive, the fit and healthy will remain, but the apathetic, the lazy, and the ill-prepared will unfortunately fall prey to the inevitable jaws of failure.

Perhaps some reading this are now eager to get a quick check up… I’ll let you go and dust off that corporate treadmill…!

It is a very simple concept – quite likely the major reason for its longevity and continued success. Barter is the exchange of goods and services for other goods and services. In essence a cashless transaction. An example is a restaurant that needs landscaping. The landscaping company does some work for the restaurant in exchange for some gift certificates. But what happens when the job is quite large and the landscape company does not want that many restaurant gift certificates, or none at all? Enter the barter exchange.

Barter companies have been around since the mid-50s in America and it is estimated that there are probably over 1400 exchanges of differing sizes and scope now in the US. Just type “barter exchange” into any Internet search engine and you will be inundated with a myriad of companies to chose from. A barter exchange steps into the one-on-one relationship that exists with traditional bartering, basically allowing businesses to trade with other businesses they have nothing in common with (or where no duality of needs exists). Take the earlier example of the landscape company. If they belonged to a reputable barter exchange they would get barter credits (usually known as barter dollars) for doing the work for the restaurant, but they could then spend that barter revenue on renting a backhoe, or getting tires for their trucks, or something equally useful to their business.

There are multiple reasons to belong to a good barter exchange, below are a few key benefits:

1. Increased revenue
2. More clients
3. Better cash flow
4. Improved efficiency
5. Greater marketing opportunities
6. Increased purchasing power

Unless a business has more work than it can handle, barter is a ‘no-brainer’ for any company. A business has all its fixed costs (rent, salaries, insurance, vehicles, machinery, etc.) whether it has one hundred customers or three hundred, if a business can take dead time or inventory that in effect is costing money and turn it into new revenue, it’s a home run. The major benefit to companies is that they get to leverage their cost of goods. Back to the landscape company, what does it really cost them to do $1000 worth of work for the restaurant? Obviously less that $1000 or they wouldn’t be in business long (usually a company’s cost of goods is 50% or less). Since barter work is absorbing their surplus time, inventory or capacity, when they barter their services they are only incurring their actual cost of goods, this means they can make purchases via the exchange for pennies on the dollar – another home run.

Organized barter companies (usually those with national scope) also have many more benefits over conventional advertising methods since they are much more proactive. Barter members call into the exchange brokerage with things they need and the brokers match those needs with other members that can fill them. There are usually fees to join, but compared to a print advertisement for example, you only pay to join once and then most exchanges are ‘pay per use’. If at all possible, when choosing a good barter company, go with one that does not encourage cash-barter blends (i.e., a portion of the transaction is cash – not strictly all barter) and join a company that insists on ‘100% trade, 100% of the time’. Any barter company that allows blends to happen usually has inflation in their economy and not too many hard goods as a consequence.

One final tip when choosing a good barter exchange, make sure they allow you to spend first – this ensures you that their barter dollars actually have tangible worth and you’ll be able to continue spending them on a long term basis. Extra revenue is fine, but if you cannot spend it, it’s as good as worthless – unfortunately some businesses have been badly hurt by less reputable barter companies this way. Most quality barter companies will actually offer a guarantee to new members that they will let you spend a barter credit balance first and get you new business. Barter is a lot of fun and with the right company can be one of the most useful business tools you ever employ.

As far as tax goes, the IRS considers all barter transactions whether directly or via an exchange exactly the same as cash revenue. Consult your tax adviser for more detailed information on how to report barter income.

Although it would appear the world is currently filled with a majority of paper currency, electronic and non-paper transactions massively outweigh this figure. Without contemplating the vast daily transactions that happen via the globalised stock markets, just consider how frequently you use your ‘plastic’. Everything from soda machines to McDonalds accepts cards, and for good reason.

Take out the obvious motivation of nations wishing to track the flow of currency for taxation purposes – and it is reasonable to accept the theory that currency was created to facilitate improved taxation – and the move towards a cashless world has many more benefits. Blood money, illegal funding of the drugs trade or terrorist activity are just three good reasons to accelerate the process.

Obviously the total abolition of ‘cash’ will be extensively slowed by the less developed countries (and not surprisingly these are areas most open to abuse by illegal money laundering), however they will be increasingly forced to transition to the pace set by The West.

When you also factor in the explosive revival of barter around the world and the pioneering efforts of such companies as Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE), who have perfected the system of ‘retail barter’ on a massive scale (almost acting as efficiently as cash) the move to a cashless world becomes even more realistic. MBE, acting as a third party record keeper, allows American businesses to trade anything from a bouquet of flowers to forklifts, and $100,000 printing jobs all 100% on barter and without the traditional need for reciprocal trades. MBE has already been approached by countries like India who are keen to implement their system as their global interface for bartering with the rest of the world.

Technology has been the key to the increasing move towards a cash free world. The benefits to the consumer are also apparent: increased protection. VISA backs up most purchases with its guarantee, and many of the others are following suit. What protection does cash afford you? Take the example of a contractor doing a cash job for a home owner. If the work is shoddy, what recourse does the resident have? Even if they win in the small claims court, they are still responsible for collection (over 90% are unsuccessful!) MBE, since it acts like a bank, covers member clients in a similar manner to VISA.

As with all ground-breaking advancements this world has seen, they are only limited by Man’s capacity to accept and implement them. We currently live in a society where you are in the complete minority, if you don’t have ‘plastic’. The scope of this article hasn’t even dipped its toe into the Internet explosion, the amount of cashless traffic that occurs via Ebay, Amazon, PayPal, et al. Let’s face it, apart from being used to having a wallet with paper money in it, do you really need it, and would you really miss it?

Let’s future-scope on that thought just a little, and I’m sorry that it potentially means the loss of many jobs, do we really have the need any more to go to banks? In one fell swoop of stepping fully into the cashless world, we would eliminate the need for the treasury mints, eliminate fraud and laundering, reduce drug trafficking and terrorist funding – perhaps some political funding too! I say, “Roll on the future!”

Barter is nothing new – it’s been around since the dawn of Man – and I’m glad such an old and tried-and-tested method of doing business is actually getting its proper and fair share of the limelight in the local and national press. If one were to be totally honest, barter is the only stable part of our global economy. Look back to the economic collapse of Argentina in 2002. It took them going back to bartering to set their economy back on track. Seven years later over 500,000 people and businesses still hold strongly to barter, because they don’t trust their cash economy. Unfortunately many other western countries are teetering dangerously close to the Argentinean scenario.

That’s obviously good news for the barter industry, and especially for Merchants Barter Exchange (www.merchantsbarter.com) with their new form of trading: MBE-barter. Like the barter our cavemen ancestors participated in, organized barter is nothing new and actually dates back to the mid-1950s here in America. The challenge has always been controlling the flow of internal currency (usually referred to as “barter dollars”) and maintaining the integrity of the barter economy (not letting members inflate prices, or take part payment in cash, or in any other way tarnish the initial reputation of the membership.)

That’s where Merchants Barter Exchange and MBE-barter stands head and shoulders above practically all the other barter organizations out there today. Because of their internal systems and “checks and balances” procedures, you will never incur any of those bad practices when utilizing MBE-barter. In fact, any member caught trying to damage the integrity of the exchange is immediately expelled from the system, thus ensuring only the very highest quality standards in the industry. Unfortunately for their competition, the only way any existing barter exchange hindered by the old way of doing things can even begin to compete on the same level is to start from scratch – that puts them almost ten years behind Merchants Barter Exchange. That’s an impressive head-start and that keeps them ahead of the pack.

Additionally, through these higher quality standards and control systems, MBE-barter allows members to conduct much bigger trades than is even remotely possible with lesser exchanges. A few examples of trades possible via MBE-barter all at 100% (something no other barter company can promote) are $100,000 printing jobs, brand new forklifts, new home and office furniture, vehicles – the list is practically endless. Because everything is transacted at the same cash price and 100% bartered, there is no difference using MBE-barter for needed goods and services as using cash or credit, except for the obvious economic and marketing benefits a member gains.

Therefore, as an alternative to cash, MBE-barter is the best substitute by far, and actually has mechanisms in place to protect existing cash business. Obviously in this Internet-age, there are many web-based barter organizations emerging, however they have simply put a “modern” face on the flawed, old ways of doing barter, which cannot stamp out blending cash and barter for trades, cannot control pricing, cannot effectively co-ordinate member trades to keep the economy balanced and flowing with integrity. In short, they probably won’t last as long as their older companions, or grow to be more than a fleeting fad.

Existing Merchants Barter Exchange members are sitting pretty and patting themselves on the back for getting involved when they did. The good news for non-members, however, is that membership is very simple and the company is expanding incredibly rapidly around the US. Most likely they coming to a city and town near you within the next twelve months (that is, if they are not already strongly established in your town!) For a nominal, lifetime membership fee almost any business can join. The rest of the costs involved with membership are minimal and predominantly pay-per-use transaction fees on purchases made.

No article concerning commerce would be totally complete without at least a slight mention of Uncle Sam. The days of tax-free barter went out the window in the 1980s when barter companies gained the same standing (third-party record keepers) as banks and credit card companies. All barter revenue is considered the same as cash as far as the IRS is concerned and all barter companies must issue 1099b forms to all members for tax reporting purposes.

The economic outlook still looks very bleak (both nationally and globally) and no educated person remotely believes an about-turn any time soon is even a concept. Dumping trillions of dollars into the pot can lead to only two certainties: higher inflation and a tax burden being passed along somewhere. It’s good news for Merchants Barter Exchange and their members, not too promising for those dependent upon the cash world, though.

1) IT’S ILLEGAL:. MYTH. Far from being illegal, barter is encouraged due to the economic benefits it creates. Any entity that has surplus stock, time, or capacity is smart to exchange what it has too much for for things it would have paid cash for (or might not have the financing for) especially in this economy. The IRS website has a section just for bartering: http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc420.html All barter income must be declared just like cash revenues. What is illegal – just like cash under the table – is not declaring trades. This is a major reason to belong to an ethical barter company like Merchants Barter Exchange that takes care of all paperwork and issues 1099b statements each year to members.

2) IT’S MORE EXPENSIVE TO BARTER. MYTH. The opposite is actually true. Barter saves money – which is the major reason governments and big business use it so much – because you are moving things you don’t need and have usually already purchased (and are probably depreciating assets). Every company has a cost of goods and operating expenses. Because barter brings brand new business from alternative sources, all barter income is produced at cost. Example: If you buy coffee cups at 20 cents on the dollar and sell them for $1.00, you have an 80% gross profit margin (out of which you cover your expenses: advertising, phones, salaries, etc.) If you have 100 cups in your inventory you can’t sell and another company is prepared to trade $100 of office supplies for your cups, economically speaking you just bought $100 of office supplies for only $20 cash outlay. Who wouldn’t want to do that? One thing to watch out for is how well an organized barter company controls trading. Some older barter companies have been known to allow their clients to inflate their barter prices, or even take part payment in cash (which is not true barter!) and something that is not easy to control when they disclose their membership list.

 3) THE QUALITY ISN’T THE SAME. MYTH. Although when you engage in direct trading with another party there is a large element of trust, since in most cases one party must go first – “You fix my truck, then I’ll do your electrical work” – but almost all direct trade occurs between people that know each other. Barter companies can often ensure better quality and more assurances, because there is no (or limited) direct trading. The majority of MBE clients state that the quality of service they receive is actually higher, because their member benefits are so good, they don’t want to risk expulsion from the exchange for not providing quality work.

4) IT’S OLD FASHIONED. MYTH. It’s the oldest form of commerce, that’s true, but it is far from old fashioned. Especially since 2000, when Merchants Barter Exchange reinvented the way organized barter is transacted to ensure all trading is conducted 100% on trade 100% of the time, and at exactly the same pricing as cash (which had never been done before at a national level.) As a comparison, farming is probably as old as bartering, but with developments in technology nobody would call farming old fashioned.

 5) YOU CAN ONLY BARTER FOR SMALL STUFF. MYTH. Although it is true when you trade directly with another business that smaller transactions are easier to manage, the advent of organized bartering has allowed almost any trade to take place. The majority of direct trades are limited to the “pizzas for a haircut” level, but with efficient and well managed systems like MBE-barter, amazing trades like $100,000+ printing jobs are possible all at 100% trade and the same as cash pricing. Theoretically, there is nothing that cannot be traded via the MBE-bartering system, since it is probably the only bartering mechanism that conducts all exchanges at the same pricing as cash.

 6) BARTER COMPANIES THAT DON’T DISCLOSE THEIR CLIENT LIST ARE BAD. LEGEND. Although at first this may make sense, when investigated deeper it is actually better to belong to a large barter company that DOES NOT disclose your private information. Since it makes much more economic sense to trade rather than spend cash, all exchanges with open lists cannot control members joining just to convert existing cash relationships to barter. It makes sense for the new member, but steals cash revenue from the older, existing members, and is usually a cheap sales trick. What is more important than a directory of members is the availability of goods and services, and the attrition rate of members. Exchanges that cannot fulfill orders usually have a very high turnover and ultimately will fail – especially in a bad economy where cash is tight.

 7) BARTER ONLY WORKS FOR SERVICES. MYTH. It is true that service companies have a lower cost of goods than a business that sells product, however, provided there are controls and assurances that the correct (same as cash) prices are being charged, both goods and services can be exchanged. The cost structure of a business does not change just because something is bartered, only the economic advantages change for the better.

ISN’T BARTER AND HAGGLING THE SAME THING? WRONG. Some people confuse the two terms. Haggling is negotiating a lower price for something, barter is simply exchanging one thing for another. There is a big difference, although certain TV shows like “Let’s Make a Deal” have confused the terms somewhat.

9) I ONLY BARTER FOR CASH. Since barter predates money/ currency, cash is actually a form of barter note (hence the term ‘bank note’.) People “exchange” their dollar bills for goods and services they need – which bridges the “my stuff for your stuff” limitation of traditional bartering. Obviously every business needs cash revenues coming in to cover various bills and expenses that they cannot barter for, but overlooking using barter as an essential part of their business model can be fatal to their success. A business interested in conserving cash is stupid not to engage in barter, if it has the opportunity because of the huge cash savings. A smart business – especially with the help of a good barter company – can potentially offset over 20% of their cash outlay. Theoretically, using the improved MBE-barter system, any business can offset much more than just 20% because the pricing is kept the same as cash, which many other barter companies cannot control.

10) THERE IS ALWAYS A WINNER AND A LOSER. MYTH. Similar to point 3) above, in traditional one-on-one bartering in many cases one party goes first and it is often difficult to find an exact dollar-for-dollar match. This is a major reason for the increasing growth and success of barter companies like Merchants Barter Exchange as they allow businesses with no commonality to gain the economic benefits of barter without directly trading with each other. There are more myths and legends out there, but hopefully I have managed to cover many of the major points and questions for any interested business owners keen to discover more about this subject. Because of the turmoil in our global marketplace, I predict a huge increase in the use of bartering to accompany traditional cash transactions, more as a necessity rather than a choice. Any business that is not seriously considering using the multiple benefits of a barter company like Merchants Barter Exchange either has a recession-proof business or is simply not serious about surviving this impending depression.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PRLog (Press Release) – May 10, 2008 – Minn./ St. Paul, MN — As Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE) continues to grow in size and scope, they are revolutionizing banking for American business owners and increasing their net cash profits. The Minneapolis/ St. Paul office now has five full time direct sales team members expanding the region and aims to have over 1,000 business members by years end.

Unlike traditional highstreet banks like Bank of America, Wachovia, et al, that are happy to extend business loans to you with interest, MBE has merged the economical benefits of barter with the control and security of traditional banking to make borrowing with them efficient and foolproof.

Unlike barter companies of old with inferior systems, MBE is able to issue loans in the form of barter credits (MBE dollars that have exactly the same value as Federal Dollars) but instead of making the borrower responsible for repaying the debt, MBE actively drives brand new business into its members’ companies generating the new revenue to repay the balance. Imagine a bank actually improving your business proactively, that’s MBE.

Not only does the MBE system make businesses more efficient and increase their loyal customer base, they actively increase their members’ net cash profits each year as a direct result of their barter mechanism. MBE members save thousands of dollars per year.

“A company spending just $2000 MBE dollars per month with a Cost of Goods of 50% will produce over $8,000 net cash dollars profit each year, and cover all membership fees as well,” states Austin Turner, Managing Partner for Minneapolis. “If a business is serious about staying in business this year, it’s a no-brainer to join and benefit from membership.”

Compared to traditional banking and conventional methods of marketing, MBE is by far the most lucrative and effective mechanism ever devised to improve your business and survive the recession. Barter is nothing new, having withstood the test of time, but since founder and owner, Steve Bolles (the “Bill Gates of Barter”), ironed out all the kinks and inefficiencies of older barter systems (inflated prices, cash-barter blends, mismanagement and lack of control), MBE is completely changing the way smart businesses do business.

For more information about membership eligibility, their franchising program, or employment opportunities, contact the respective departments below:

Franchising: steve@merchantsbarter.com
Employment: lori.janczak@merchantsbarter.com
Membership: martib@merchantsbarter.com
www.merchantsbarter.com

# # #

About Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE): the nation’s only 100% trade-only barter company allowing business members to spend first on thousands of goods and services they would have spent cash on. MBE proactively assists all members to gain more business, increase revenues, lower expenses and increase net cash profits.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PRLog (Press Release) – Feb 19, 2009 – Allentown, PA – Amidst the negative news headlines of record-breaking lay-offs, billion dollar bail-outs, corruption, and corporations posting embarrassing losses, it is very refreshing to hear a revival of older times and better values now getting their fair share of exposure. The age-old tradition of barter is back in vogue. What’s more, it’s comforting to hear that Christians are once more spearheading this rejuvenation, and helping lead people back to Christ.

Steve and Marti Bolles co-founded Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE) back in 2000 in preparation for just such economic woes as we are currently experiencing. The pioneering couple has been a member of King of Kings Worship Center in Bernardsville, NJ, for over ten years, and even though they relocated to Pennsylvania, they still make the journey into Jersey each Sunday for worship. Rather than label themselves a ‘Christian’ company, they prefer to be seen as a company founded by Christians and run on Christian values and principles. “God’s blessed me with success in business before,” states Bolles, “but in this instance, God told me to start this company… he even gave me the blue-print to build this alternative currency for the hard times ahead.”

When Bolles first mentioned his idea to the established barter industry of a bartering company based on the principle of “100% trade, 100% of the time” (now a company motto) and founded upon strong Christian values, as a true alternative currency mechanism, he was ridiculed and told, “It cannot be done!” Never before had a US barter company conducted trade on a full-barter basis – almost all other barter organizations only trade out the labor element, some even allow a different, higher price for bartering. MBE’s ‘pure’ barter system gives them the ability to do much larger trades than any other group, to date no other retail barter company has done such work as $100,000 printing jobs exclusively on trade.

Non-Christians may scoff at the concept, but any student of the Scriptures will understand why MBE is now growing at an exponential rate in these very challenging times. Operating similar to a private bank, the MBE-barter system allows its members to trade for much-needed goods and services instead of spending cash. New members are set up with a barter bank account with a $2000 line of credit to spend. Unlike traditional, one-on-one barter – where each party has to want the other party’s things in exchange – this system allows any member to trade with any other member independently, just like spending cash. Shawn Cressman – a client turned Licensee – owner of Cressman’s Lawn & Tree Care states, “I saved so much money on things I used in my landscape business by trading for it instead of using cash, that when I learned I could own and run my own MBE territory, it was a no-brainer.”

MBE is not just helping businesses weather these tough economic times, as majority licensee, Anthony Donnelly, admits, “When Steve and MBE came into my life, I was on a serious decline… I’d always had a connection to God, but Steve helped me find Jesus again. I honestly don’t know where I’d be, if I hadn’t been saved.” Donnelly, originally born in England, began his journey with the company as a salesman over three years ago, and now owns and operates a number of locations around the US. He also has plans later this year to spearhead their expansion into the European markets. “God has truly blessed my life with this opportunity. I feel this is my life calling.”

Unlike many companies today, MBE is currently expanding exponentially due to the downward economy, opening new offices around the country, and employing more people along the way. One of their latest offices in Minnesota is growing at a staggering rate. Tram Holloway, Licensee for St. Paul, MN, a fellow Christian says simply, “No one has any money right now. If you’re a business owner and you need stuff, why wouldn’t you use MBE-barter to get it? Some people get it, some people don’t, and others have to be pushed through the open door!”

“I couldn’t be more excited,” beams Bolles. “It is truly a blessing that our company is prospering and doing good deeds around the nation. The fact that we are helping lead people back to the Lord is worth more than the financial gains.” Another office is opening up in the Sacramento, CA, area – the birthplace of organized barter in the US – early this year, and many other offices are scheduled for later in 2009 already.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

# # #

About Merchants Barter Exchange: National “100% trade, 100% of the time” barter company allowing businesses of all sizes to trade what they have too much of for things they would have spent valuable cash on. Currently expanding all around North America and seeking to expand internationally in 2010.

Helping thousands of American businesses ‘trade’ away their economic blues for necessary goods and services in a time when they are needed most.

Barter is the new king. Deposing the old cash king took a world wide economic near-collapse. I say near-collapse because anarchy hasn’t yet occurred. In the wake of scandal and difficulty, we as a world people are remembering our forgotten roots. Hundreds of years ago, in the civilized world, we bartered. As a matter of fact, we bartered. There were no hard currencies available in large quantities. If anything, we traded bank notes, assuming we could get our share of whatever was guaranteed by the bank, whether it be metal or other mineral. Now, we assume we can get what we want by giving up what we have…a classic barter.

In reality, though, barter has been alive and strong since the beginning of civilization, even in the last century of national currencies and digital economies.

I know what you’re thinking: barter is useless. But you may be mistaken. Because an astonishingly large proportion of the global trade in goods and services is barter-based, to protect traders against alarming currency fluctuations.

In one of the most famous examples, Pepsi took profits from Soviet Russia in the form of vodka. The largest barter of all time took place last year: China agreed to build massive infrastructure in the Democratic Republic of Congo in exchange for copper and cobalt supplies worth an estimated £6 billion. About the same time, Saudi Arabia and Iran agreed with Pakistan and Thailand, respectively, to swap oil for food.

Large trades occur on a daily basis. And like our friend from the UK points out, many businesses use barter as a way to avoid problems related to currency value.

Ormita, one of the new attempts at an international barter currency, aims to take that value of a currency and translate it across borders. I have to admit, I had the same dream ten years ago. Imagine a world in which the value of your currency could translate and transcend international boundaries.

Even if your dream is smaller or just focused on your community, a local barter exchange adds much needed availability to business, in times of plenty or scarsity. So, cash is dead…long live the new king: barter.

SHAWN CRESSMAN: We had a truck lose a transmission. It just died and it was not in my budget to fix it.

FARRIS: What’s a landscaping company without trucks that work? Shawn Cressman with Cressman Lawn and Tree care in Hellertown says thanks to Merchants Barter Exchange, it’s a question he didn’t have to answer.

SHAWN CRESSMAN: They were able to put us in contact with two transmission shops and we went the better of the bid and we didn’t pay cash for it we just traded landscaping.

FARRIS: Cressman Lawn and Tree care is one of 100 businesses in the Lehigh Valley using the barter system.. Cressman was able to get the new transmission, tires, a storage shed and business cards..

STEVE BOLLES: The worse the economy does the better that we do. When people don’t have extra money to spend but they’ve got extra time or extra equipment they are willing to trade that time or equipment or product for things they want to spend money on anyway.

FARRIS: Steve Boles is the founder of Monroe-county based Merchants Barter Exchange. Boles says there’s no cash component to the system…just barter dollars exchanged by members of the exchange.

STEVE BOLLES: We have had businesses actually say they’ve stayed in business because of barter. It was a Godsend, it saved my butt for the end of the year we were able to finish the year with that truck.

FARRIS: Cressman says the best part of the program is after doing barter work for the owner of a muffler shop.. And he was able to expand his customer base and bring in more cash. We did landscaping around his house he used every trade dollar he had with us and he still wanted more so he ended up paying cash for those extra things and then his neighbor saw that we fertilized lawns and we got business from him as well.

For more information, visit MerchantsBarter.com or call 800-822-7204.

In Hellertown, Jaccii Farris 69 News.

Guest post by Sam Fuller

Everybody – individuals and businesses alike – love to save money. Especially these day. Craigslist is hitting the headlines with an 80% increase in postings in their barter section, and sensational stories like the recently-married couple in CA that got $75,000 worth of stuff for their wedding that way. That’s all great news for the barter business.

Barter is nothing new, though, and it surprises me every time an economy takes a little tumble the topic of barter bounces back into the limelight. It’s almost as though barter is the ginger-headed, ugly, second cousin you only bring out at night, or if really necessary. This is a little upsetting to me, especially amid all the talk from global leaders about ensuring this type of economic catastrophe doesn’t happen again and that better oversight is implemented.

The trickle-down effect of treasury departments around the globe printing more money is beginning to have its short-term effect of easing concerns that the economy had crashed completely (in other words, multiple countries had actually gone bankrupt!) For the most part, people seem to be ‘business as usual’ and embracing a much-needed and welcomed upswing. How soon the inflationary effects of this short-sighted action will appear is not so clear, just like the meteoric impact of the tax burden it created.

So, back to the simplicity of our ugly second-cousin: barter. Proven to be the bedrock and true safe haven for thousands of years, bartering has a stronger track record than gold and other commodities (and cannot be recalled by governments, as precious metals have been!) Barter is as effective as it is simple, and almost anybody or any business can easily reap the benefits.

Barter companies of all types abound – and, like mechanics – some are much better than others. Provided you chose an exchange that allows you to protect your pre-existing cash clients (usually by NOT handing out an open listing), engage in “true” bartering (where there is no cash element to the transaction, e.g., cash for the parts or materials), are actually allowed to try the integrity of the exchange by buying first, and where the prices and quality are identical to paying cash, the benefits of bartering can actually be BETTER than using cash.

How is barter better? Simple, because bartering takes stuff you DON’T want and exchanges it for things you DO want. Any business that has inventory lying around (and that’s most these days) has already footed the bill or is financing that inventory. If they barter part of that stock for an item they would have spent cash on, it has now allowed them to purchase at THEIR cost. A barter company should ensure a fair trade, because it won’t be direct like a traditional one-on-one trade (I swap you a sheep for a pig, for example!)

Where do you lose out on barter? The major areas that businesses actually lose money bartering is if they are with a badly run exchange. There are some out there that have gone astray from a true, zero-sum economy and their dollars are not worth face value any more. There are horror stories about business owners left sitting with tens of thousands of ‘barter’ dollars that are practically worthless. Additional revenue is great, but if it cannot be spent on anything useful, where is the value? Sadly, quite a few of the barter companies out there that disclose their clients’ information or are internet based cannot control how trade is conducted.

Saving Money by Bartering. The best way to save money is to do your homework, chose a reputable barter exchange that offers an up-front credit line to spend, it’s better to go with one that has a national reputation, a strong sales support team, and is centrally brokered charging only for the purchases you make.

Real barter has only one major purpose: to increase efficiency and bolster cash flow. Knock-on benefits include the obvious increase in revenue, new customers, better marketing, more spending power, cash savings, turnover of inventory, and many other incidental positives. Barter is quite literally only limited by your own imagination. When done correctly via a high-quality reputable bartering exchange, you really cannot go far wrong and you have tens of thousands of dollars in savings and new revenue to gain.

Be bold, be thorough in your research, be cautious if it is free, as there probably isn’t much value in something that’s cheap or free, but most of all be imaginative and enjoy bartering… Mankind has been doing it for thousands of years, and will most likely still be engaging in trade thousands of years hence.

###

Sam Fuller is a freelance writer and blogger writing on multiple topics concerning finance, money, and frugality.

The good news about barter and the positive wave of help and assistance it’s bringing to businesses in need around the US continues to spread. Once again it’s encouraging to hear that Merchants Barter Exchange is spearheading the thrust of positive PR about the industry.

Steve Bolles, founder and President of Merchants Barter Exchange, recently finished a whirlwind radio tour of over 16 national radio shows promoting the benefits and virtues of the highly-proven MBE-system.

“It was an exhilerating challenge,” comments Bolles, who was approached independently six weeks prior to the tour. “I’ll always try to make time in my schedule to help educate and promote the true value barter brings to the business world.”

The tour – conducted predominently via phone – last week included brief appearances on shows like Lifestyle Talk Radio with Frankie Boyer, WDIS Newstalk with Dan Collier, “Ericka and Jack Attack”, Bob Langstaff with WAMV, and Rude Awakenings with “Bulldog” Jeff the Dude.

Steve and MBE, with the continued solid work by their PR company Smith & Associates, are looking forward to a very strong third quarter of continued record growth around the US and even more media exposure in print, radio, and soon on TV news shows.

###

Members of the media wishing to interview Mr Bolles, or contact MBE about their incredible activities in the national business community should contact their liason, Caitlin, at Smith & Associates: 919 674-6020

Already in existence for 8 years in the rest of the country, Merchant’s Barter Exchange has rolled into town and is helping local businesses to conserve cash, decrease their excess inventory, and generate new sales.

Already, local businesses are starting to take notice.

Eric Wood, of local web design service MoonViper Web Services says that since he began working with Merchant’s Barter Exchange, his business has more than doubled, and he’s having to turn away projects because of too much demand. He’s looking into hiring more designers to help handle the workload.

According to the Los Angeles Times (August 11th “Local currencies cash in on recession”), communities all over the country are starting to generate their own local currencies based on the federal government and major banks inability to provide enough currency to the marketplace.

“This currency could be used to pay for goods and services in the marketplace, such as carpet cleaning, dentist appointments, and clothing, but because of the banks lack of funds in the mortgage fallout of last year, businesses are having a hard time getting loans” says Wood.

“Businesses today are not suffering from a lack of demand, they are suffering from a lack of money to pay for their services” he continues. “By providing those goods and services to the economy, businesses stand to generate valuable trade currency, which they can then use in exchange for other goods and services which they need.”

Merchant’s Barter Exchange works by allowing members to trade their goods and services for other things that they need. For instance, a web designer may create a website for one client, and in exchange, they are able to trade the value of that service for other items they need. With Merchant’s Barter’s nationwide network, and over 10,000 member businesses, the list of items and services available is huge.

Member businesses provide everything from hotel rooms and spa visits, to expensive luxury condos. As long as the goods and services are traded at the same value, everyone receives a fair deal, and the economy continues chugging along.

Unlike the local scrip described in the Los Angeles Times article, Barter Dollars earned through the exchange are good nationwide, at any participating business, and are spent just like cash. When asked how he spent his Barter Dollars, Wood said that he has used them for sign printing to promote his business, hotel stays for out of town guests, and even financed his entire wedding using Barter Dollars. “Though the exchange, I was able to find a wedding planner, a florist, limos, cakes, a tremendous catering service, even the diamond rings that are now our wedding bands.”

Long time Burning Man participants know that, on the playa, cash is not only not needed, it’s not welcome. Everything at the Burning Man festival is traded, and that’s part of the allure for those who attend the festival. Some even feel that allowing cash trades would completely destroy the feeling of the event.

Even Craigslist has noticed the uptick in trades across the county, and has a great graph on their blog showing a huge increase in the number of barter postings nationwide. “As we’ve seen during down economies in the past, growth in usage of the “barter” section of Craigslist is accelerating, up more than 100% in the last year alone .”

Wood plans to continue to accept Barter Dollars to grow his business. “By allowing me so many options,” he says, “I’m free to grow my business the way I want, and at the same time, meet some great people.”

Editor’s Note: We found this article online recently and thought it was well-written and informative and provided many reasons why anybody considering engaging in a barter transaction should contact Merchants Barter Exchange to ensure smooth sailing in their deals. Enjoy!

###

By Sharifah Hardie

WHAT IS BARTER?

For the purpose of this article we are referring to the barter system as an agreement between business owners to give something in EXCHANGE for receiving something else. For example: One business owner may provide financial services, and another may do web design. Now you may think these businesses are so vast and so different they have nothing in common. However, in taking a closer look we see they have a very important element in common; they are both potentially in need of each other’s services.

IS BARTERING RIGHT FOR YOU?

There are many business owners who are adamantly against bartering. They will tell you that it’s a waste of time. These are the business owners who already make enough money and aren’t willing to work together in order to get ahead. If these things apply to you stop reading now. However, if you want to build your team without spending any extra money — and wouldn’t mind HELPING someone else out in order to improve your own status — bartering is definitely the way to go.

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF BARTERING?

Bartering carries with it a number of attractive benefits:

• No out of pocket COST to you
• Increased name recognition by association
• Increased POWER on your team
• Input of other professionals in your company’s functioning
• Use of other SERVICES you might not be able to afford
• Opportunities for networking with different professionals

NAME RECOGNITION

What do we mean by increased name recognition by association? Once you barter with a high PROFILE business your name is going to be seen more, remembered more and as a result recognized more by your target audience. The key to effective bartering is bartering with a company that is COMPARABLE with yours. If you own a shoe store bartering or doing a joint venture with a sock store would be the ultimate barter. You would recommend the sock store’s services in return for them recommending yours. I mean after all if you need socks, you’re going to need shoes. You also have increased name recognition by association because as the sock store is recommending your services the customers realize that if the sock store is willing to associate with your company you must be a wonderful company. A win-win situation for everyone involved.

FINDING BUSINESS OWNERS WILLING TO BARTER

Contact business owners you are already in contact with, your current pool. Also think of business types that are comparable to yours and search for them on the web or in your local business directory. Then contact the business owner with an OFFER.

GIVE THEM A REASON

Keep in mind that every business owner is just like you in that they are looking to EXPAND their businesses as inexpensively as possible. If you can answer the all time, number one, most important question for a business owner, “What’s in it for ME?” the likelihood of the business owner agreeing to barter with you increases tremendously. What do you have to lose but a little time and effort? The yes’s you receive will be worth the no’s. Just keep it up and remember those yes’s are exposure you would not have had. So get out there and ask for it.

###

Original URL: http://www.evancarmichael.com/Small-Business-Consulting/4164/The-Barter-System–Overlooked-and-Underrated.html

Barter is the most topical buzz-word in business right now due to the continued bad economy and the dire need for American companies that are going to foot the tax bill for the bail-out to be more creative. Competition is greater than ever, credit is still very tight, and people are more reluctant to spend on non-essentials. Unemployment creeping dangerously close to 10% isn’t helping calm the mayhem either.

So, what is barter and why is there such a buzz about it?

Barter, simply put, is the cashless exchange of goods and services between parties. An example of a barter would be a florist exchanging a bouquette of flowers for an oil change at a car repair shop.

But why do companies barter, and how does it work?

Let’s build on the above example. The florist has already bought and paid for the flowers (they are in her inventory as a perishable item.) What does it really cost her to put together a $35 bunch of flowers? Her cost (cost of goods) is probably about $15, if it was any higher, she would not have the gross margin available to cover her overhead (rent, insurance, marketing, salaries, etc.) So, if she trades that $35 bunch of flowers for an oil change she would have paid $35 cash for, here are her benefits:

1. She just saved herself $20 in cash
2. She turned over her inventory
3. She potentially made a new customer
4. She has potentially marketed herself to a new area

How does this benefit the mechanic? It helps him in much the same way. He saves himself the cash outlay for the flowers, she becomes a new customer, she may recommend him to her friends and associates, and he filled some dead or down time he had.

That sounds like quite a laborious way to save $20 cash, right?

So, why is there such a buzz about bartering, if companies are saving so little? The above scenario was an example of traditional barter or what is called reciprocal trading (just like the old days, two parties trading with each other.) Even though it seems a small saving, it’s actually almost a 50% cost reduction. What if you could save 50% on other things? Construction work, landscaping, printing, perhaps put on a new roof, take a vacation, do more advertising, or repave your parking lot?

The challenge of traditional barter, and the Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE) solution.

Any smart business owner would love to be able to save 50% on their cash expenses. The problem with traditional barter are:

1. Finding a match – how do you find a roofer that wants $5000 of flowers?
2. Timing, if you do find a roofer, do they want the flowers now?
3. How do you ensure the trade happens?

Horror stories abound with people trying to barter with others and not getting a fair deal: either they give their stuff and the other party doesn’t reciprocate, or they short them, or it simply doesn’t happen as planned. Obviously, there is no benefit to something that doesn’t happen correctly, but how do you ensure it is fair for all concerned? Even using an organized barter company from the last century had its problems (inflated pricing, cash-blends negating the savings benefits, cash business converting to barter, and under the table deals.)

That was all until Merchants Barter Exchange (MBE) came on the scene in 2000, setting a brand new standard for organized bartering and changing the industry forever. Since then, every other barter company of any size has been trying to copy the ethics and standards of MBE, which thus far is the only American barter company to be able to do large scale bartering (like $100,000 of printing, $70,000 of paving work, $30,000 worth of appliances, all entirely on trade with no cash.)

So what does MBE do differently?

By acting as both the bank and the co-ordinator between transactions, MBE is able to control how trades are handled. In simple terms, demand for goods and services comes into the MBE central brokerage from the members around the US. From there, the barter experts co-ordinate where that demand goes. Nothing is traded directly, so there are none of the challenges of one party going first, then not getting stuff in return. The MBE brokers keep track of everything via their sophisticated software platform, transferring barter dolars as credits for the equal cash value of trades.

It sounds very simple, and MBE makes it look so, but be warned: many companies have tried to copy their model and failed, losing hundreds of thousands of dollars. American Express was involved at the same time as MBE started in 2000 with an online barter group called BigVine.com. By 2003 they had entirely blown a $800m budget. Because of the new standards MBE are setting, many older barter companies are actually going into decline right now, rather than expanding. Even BarterCard, the world’s largest barter company, could not maintain a presence in the US for very long and after less than 3 years filed bankrupcy in 2006.

What are the tax implications?

Obviously, any form of commerce has the interest of Uncle Sam. Back in 1982, an act of Congress deemed all barter companies the same as banks and credit card companies (“Third Party Record Keepers”) as such they must issue 1099b forms to members each year, and all transations are treated the same as cash for reporting needs. See here for IRS details (http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc420.html).

All in all, barter – when done correctly via an organization like MBE – can be an incredibly positive business and marketing tool for any business big or small. The main point, do your research, don’t be rushed in to a direct trade, and make sure they adhere to the MBE bartering standards: can you buy first? Are all transactions 100% on trade (no cash element for parts, etc.)? Are all prices 100% the same as cash? (if they are inflating the price, remember you’re paying more commissions!) Are you only being charged when you buy? (if you are being charged selling and buying, where’s the motivation on the barter company to help you spend?)

Barter is a lot of fun, and you don’t have to be in business to enjoy it – remember when you used to trade baseball cards? It’s basically the same thing. In that scenario though, can you imagine trading your baseball cards for a new car? That would surely be a school kid’s dream come true!

Peter Daniels, owner of Print 411, is firmly standing by Merchants Barter Exchange. “MBE is a remarkable company providing a remarkable service to businesses like Print 411 around the country,” stated Daniels. “I will continue investing my time with Merchants Barter and will honor my membership with the company.”

Print 411 generally works within their Tri-state area, however Merchants Barter Exchange allows the company to extend their services nationwide. As a result, Print 411 has gained customers who would have otherwise been unattainable.

“Being known nationwide is very exciting for this company. My broker does a great job advertising us throughout all of the members and I also find out about members I would never have utilized if it wasn’t for barter,” stated Daniels.

Print 411 is planning on taking on a $30,000 printing job for a firm in one of the newest MBE territories in the Midwest. MBE has recently completed a successful training program in Phoenix and Seattle

For those unfamiliar with barter, what is Merchants Barter Exchange and what does it do?

Historically barter is the one-on-one exchange of similar or like-valued goods or services instead of using cash or currency. Merchants Barter Exchange is an ever-growing national network of diversified business owners that utilize the simplicity, ease and efficiency of our MBE-barter system to trade for multiple hard goods and services at the same price as cash with other members of our network. In short we have created an alternative payment mechanism for business owners to turn what they have too much of (time, inventory, or capacity – in essence their inefficiency) into positive revenue, increased cash flow, better marketing, and save a bunch of cash as they do so.

What was your inspiration behind Merchants Barter Exchange?

Back in the 90s I had another business and was a member of an older and very different kind of barter company. The more I used their antiquated mechanism, the more I noticed many flaws and huge areas of improvement. They had no systems in place to prevent people inflating the price of their goods or services, or price gouging, they also charged when a client bought and when they sold, they didn’t seem to have much control over how people traded and with whom, and even allowed members to pay part in cash and part in trade, which didn’t seem to make any sense to me. Most of the other members I dealt with were very unhappy with the overall system. That’s when I started to look for a better barter company, but after extensive research I discovered that every single barter company had the same flaws and challenges.

So what did you do to make Merchants Barter Exchange so different?

Firstly, we centralized the control and the membership list. This allowed us to ensure we only sent members brand new business and were not converting cash clients to trade clients. It also ensured we had secure systems in place to stop people charging more than they would for a cash transaction. It didn’t make any sense to pay more because it was barter, as you lost all the economical benefits. Since we have the control, we are able to expel any member that should try to break the rules that keep our system running effectively. Secondly, with control of the integrity and value of the MBE-barter dollar, it allowed us to do large and small trades for our members. I believe we are the only national barter company that can brag the ability to do $100,000 printing jobs 100% on trade with no cash element. Thirdly, since our system worked so well, we expanded very rapidly and needed to develop a solid and ongoing direct sales division to ensure we were able to meet as many of our members needs as we could. To date I think we have the best fulfillment rate and the greatest client retention rate (95%) of any barter company in the US.

What are you currently doing to ease the crisis in the US economy?

Even though we have grown steadily since we began in 2000, we are nowhere nearly as large as I would have liked us to be by now to help the millions of small business owners around the US, and around the world that can benefit from the MBE-barter system. Right now we are working on rolling out our corporate licensing program as fast as we can to reach as many new businesses and as many new cities around the US as we can. The major challenge has been screening the right entrepreneurial candidates that not only have the investment capital to buy in, but have the right morals, ethics, and responsibility for us to allow the priviledge to own and operate a local sales region. We are helping all those we can right now and improving the lives of our members and people in their communities, in time we will help increasingly more individuals.

Looking to the future, do you have any plans to expand beyond the US?

Absolutely! Our primary focus obviously is to assist the American business owners right now, however we created our business model to be a global monetary alternative. We already have interest from other countries around the world eager to implement our system into their economies. When the time is right we’ll definately expand internationally. Everything in good time.

I also heard you’re working on a book, is this true?

Yes. I’ve been co-collaborating on a book about the industry and the major differences and functions of the MBE-barter system with a close colleague in the industry. Right now we have more pressing issues to deal with and the book project has taken a slight back seat. We’ll finish it in due course, but it’s been an interesting project to work on.

Doug mentioned he had bartered often in the past, as he also owns and runs his own dairy farm – who hasn’t heard of a farmer that barters! Roberta – aka the “Queen of Cheap” – added that she had utilized the many benefits of bartering in her business experience. Both were interested in Merchants Barter Exchange’s rapid and successful expansion program.

In light of growing concerns about the ‘real’ stability and direction of the US and global economy, MBE could not have asked for more fertile times to be rolling out their aggressive business licensing program. Unlike most other barter companies, MBE insists on transactions being 100% on trade (no part cash, part barter, or ‘blends’ as they are called in the industry) and actually allows all members to spend first, if they wish (which most other companies say, but rarely actually can!) Most importantly in this current “cash is king” environment, MBE has systems in place to stop pre-existing cash clients being converted to barter ones.

* * *

More information about owning and running your own MBE exchange can be found at: Licensing Info Site. Additional information about the Good Day Show that broadcasts to 360 stations nationwide and airs week days 4am – 10am to approximately 3 million listeners: http://www.dougstephan.com/.

The MBE Information Booth

Hundreds of Christian businesses, business owners, and industry experts converged upon the beautiful city of Austin, Texas, on April 22nd to 25th for this years K.E.Y.S. event (Kingdom Economic Yearly Summit) at the Promiseland Church.

More than forty speakers and panelists like Os Hillman, Dr Lance Wallnau, Dr Matt Mannino, and Dr Sharon Stone captivated the audience with their insight, awakenings, and knowledge about Christian solutions to the increasing global economic troubles effecting business today.
The Main Stage

The Main Stage

Merchants Barter Exchange was priviledged to be one of the major sponsors of this years event, and the radically different and effective MBE-bartering system gained incredible attention from almost all attendees. Representing the company were licensees Shawn Cressman and Anthony Donnelly, and founder and President, Steve Bolles.

“It was as if the entire conference was organized just for us!” states Cressman. Speakers like Pat Franis and economist Dennis Peacock, to name just a couple, actually called for a reinvented method of doing business: namely a return to the proven system of bartering to solve our economic woes.

The entire conference was extremely envigorating, as Donnelly comments, “I’ve been to many events in the US and in Europe, but this summit was incredible… the energy and power of all the participants was almost overwhelming.”

Branding the event as a “total success”, Bolles and his growing barter organization have extremely high hopes for a continued growth in 2009, predicted to be even larger than their growth the previous year.

Our thanks goes to Dr Bruce Cook and his team for organizing such a fantastic Christian business event. For more information about K.E.Y.S., go to http://kingdomeconomicsummit.com

A few dozen local businesses banded together this spring to distribute the Plenty — a local currency intended to replace the dollar. Now 15,000 Plenties are in circulation here, used everywhere from the organic food co-op to the feed store to, starting last month, the Piggly Wiggly supermarket.

Last popularized during the Great Depression, scrip, or locally created stand-ins for U.S. currency, is making a comeback. Pittsboro, population 2,500, is one of three communities that launched its own money in recent months. It reports an avalanche of calls from other communities that have lost faith in the global financial system.

“The Plenty is not going to get siphoned off to Wall Street, or Washington, or make a stop in Bentonville on its way to China,” said B.J. Lawson, a software entrepreneur who is president of the board of the Plenty cooperative. “It gives us self-reliance.”

Over the past two decades, a few communities have created their own cash in an effort to preserve local ties or businesses. These whimsically named bills — such as the “BerkShare” or the “Cheer” — can be spent at neighborhood merchants, who then can use them at other local shops or, should they choose to, trade them in for federal currency or other goods.

So far, none of them face the extreme pressures that popularized scrip during the Depression — bank failures that dried up the supply of cash in circulation, requiring governments to come up with novel ways to keep commerce alive.

“Right now there’s a lot of interest because of the economy, but a lot of these efforts come about to rebuild social capital,” said Ed Collom, a sociology professor at the University of Southern Maine who studies local currencies. “There’s been concern about lack of trust, neighbors not knowing each other. They see this as a way of neighbors helping each other.”

In Detroit, for example, the Cheer was created not due to the city’s chronic financial woes but because bar owner Jerry Belanger wanted to encourage patrons to support new local businesses. He issued notes good at neighborhood merchants, backed by a cash reserve at his bar. The idea caught on fast, and other taverns agreed to help back the currency. There are now $3,000 worth of Detroit Cheers in circulation after about four months.

“It’s like a wink or a secret handshake,” Belanger said. “People want to demonstrate they care about the community.”

In Mesa, Ariz., a suburb of 450,000 east of Phoenix, the motive has been purely financial. The city has no property tax and relies almost exclusively on its sales tax. Receipts plummeted 12.5 percent in the last quarter of 2008. Johann Zietsman, director of the city’s Arts Center, noticed that only 30% percent to 40 percent of seats were selling as people tightened their belts.

Thus was born Mesa Bucks. Shoppers who spend money at stores in the city limits can bring their receipts to the Arts Center and receive a percentage of the sales tax they paid as Bucks. Right now the currency can be spent only at the Arts Center and city museums, but officials are talking with two malls about distributing them and believe some local merchants will accept Bucks.

“Everybody is having a tough time,” Zietsman said. “Incentives are always popular.”

The western New York college town of Ithaca is believed to be the first community in recent memory to have revived scrip by starting the Ithaca Hour in 1991. Other places, including Portland, Maine, and Traverse City, Mich., followed suit.

In western Massachusetts, activists and a local nonprofit banded together in 2006 to create the BerkShare. Since then, 2.5 million BerkShares have circulated in the leafy towns of the Berkshire Mountains. Residents can exchange $95 for 100 BerkShares, giving an incentive to use the scrip.

Susan Witt, executive director of the E.F. Schumacher Society, which advocates scrip and other ways to build local economies, helped create the BerkShares. She said that as recently as the early 20th century, banks issued their own scrip that would be used in towns and cities across the country.

“We gave it up for the convenience of a national currency,” Witt said, adding that it remains legal to mint your own money. “Regions opened themselves to being vulnerable to the ins and outs of the national economy.”

The Plenty — or Piedmont Local EcoNomy Tender — first launched in 2002 in another central North Carolina community. It quickly folded because the bills piled up in the few businesses that would accept them, a problem that experts say dooms the majority of scrips. Residents in Pittsboro, a collection of stately clapboard homes and repurposed brick warehouses 17 miles south of the university town of Chapel Hill, decided to try again this spring.

The new incarnation of the Plenty can be exchanged for dollars at a bank in Pittsboro, and backers say they are trying to diversify the businesses that will accept the bills. Melissa Frey, who administers the Plenty cooperative, noted that a local chiropractor and an aromatherapist have agreed to take Plenties, but no mainstream health providers or gas stations have signed on.

Though local activism spurred the currency’s revival, Frey said, businesses seem increasingly receptive because of the recession. “It does happen to be the right time to sell this program to people.”

The bills are designed and printed by local artists, with a wide variety of designs and serial numbers to combat counterfeiting. A couple of businesses in town already pay employees partly in Plenties. Proponents are most excited that the local Piggly Wiggly — a franchise owned by a local family — has agreed to start accepting the currency.

Owner Blake Evans said he has “low expectations, but long-term, maybe it’ll be something that catches on.” He has been explaining the concept to his employees, some of whom had concluded that the motto on the bills, “In Each Other We Trust” (printed in soy ink on 80 percent recycled paper), meant the currency is anti-religious. “It certainly is not,” Evans said.

One of the anchors of the Plenty is the General Store Cafe, a cavernous eatery and deli where, waiters report, customers have regularly been leaving Plenty bills as tips. Owner Vance Remick said that when people use the Plenty it feels more like a personal transaction — the sort that could only occur in a unique community.

“You want to feel special,” Remick said, “wherever you are.”

Originally Published in the Los Angeles Times

Robert Josefs, a New Jersey resident, traded his Web site designing skills for nearly $1,000 in dental work last year when he had no insurance, and many other patients are learning that health care debts don’t always have to be settled with sometimes-precious cash.

Health care bartering has risen dramatically since the recession began, as people lose their health insurance and consumer spending drops.

The Web site Craigslist says overall bartering posts have more than doubled over the past year as the recession took hold.

People who barter for health care say the practice allows them to stretch their resources or receive care they couldn’t afford. But bartering can be tricky, and not every health care provider will consider it.

Some doctors are open to bartering directly with patients. Others do their trading through an exchange like Merchant’s Barter.

These exchanges allow people to trade goods and services with other exchange members generally for barter dollars. They can then use those dollars to pay a health care provider who also belongs to the exchange.

These exchanges charge membership and transaction fees, and they also help members deal with tax implications of bartering. Hotel rooms, restaurant meals and services like plumbing are among the more popular items traded.

Direct bartering depends on the patient having a service or good the doctor needs. That’s a wide range at The Barter Clinic on the edge of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Floyd, Virginia.

Johanna Nichols barters produce from her organic vegetable farm with Susan Osborne, an osteopathic physician. Nichols, a Floyd resident, said she barters less than $600 in care every growing season to help offset a high-deductible insurance plan that covers her family.

“We still are paying our health insurance premiums every month,” she said. “It’s just kind of an extra way to stretch our dollars.”

Josefs, the Web site designer, found quick acceptance for his services. A dentist about an hour from his New Jersey home responded a few days after he posted a notice last year on Craigslist, the popular online classifieds site. He had chipped a dental veneer, but he had no insurance at the time.

“There’s a lot of out-of-pocket expenses that I was really just hoping not to pay,” he said.

Josefs had bartered successfully once before — by doing some Web design work for a sushi restaurant he and his wife frequent — and decided to try again. After calling an insurer to make sure his barter partner was an actual dentist, Josefs got about $900 in work in return for designing a Web site for the dental practice.

He and the dentist hashed out a price after Josefs showed some sample Web sites and explained their cost.

Web design is a popular bartering tool, but sometimes a specific skill isn’t necessary.

New Sharon, Maine, resident Anita Allen is spending part of her summer volunteering at nearby Franklin Memorial Hospital to help trim her uninsured grandson’s medical debt. Allen, 72, works in the hospital’s kitchen and gift shop under its Contract for Care program, which pays her by reducing the debt, which she figures may be around $8,000.

She said her grandson took two trips to the emergency room for car and snowmobile accidents. He suffered no serious injuries, but the ambulance rides and exams that followed were pricey.

“It sure helps to give time and pay off a bill because those bills run up quite fast,” she said.

Florida resident Steve Armstrong said his wife is getting a $6,000 dental implant paid by barter dollars he piled up through his business, Steve’s Termite & Pest Control.

Armstrong earns barter dollars by doing a few days of work each month for fellow members of International Barter Exchange.

“Then the word of mouth from them goes to cash-buying customers too,” he said. “It’s like free advertising.”

Bartering to pay health care bills is generally limited to specialties like dentistry or smaller doctor practices that are less bureaucratic, said Andrew Whinston, a University of Texas at Austin professor who has studied bartering.