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I'll tell you a short story about how some grow their business.

There are two craft breweries, both started by 3 friends, let's call one Pirate and the other Shape.

The owners of Pirate want to be the best and biggest craft brewery in the state and eventually the country, the want to emulate their American craft heroes like Sierra Nevada Brewing.

Shape wants the same thing, but Pirate has a few years head start on them.

Pirate produce all the right brews, they have tastings and sales at their brewing shed and soon offer food.  Just like they do in the USA, the model for craft brewery experiences.

Shape also has the brews that customers want, great quality beers at a great venue, and food for customers to enjoy.

Both breweries win awards for their beers and sell all over the country.

Customers go to Pirate and ask if they can pay with cash "of course" says the Pirate owners. They decided long ago that without customers they are nothing, and that they will go the extra mile to try and make all their customers happy. They outgrow their location and purchase a large block of land and start building a new and bigger brewery with a fabulous area for customers.

Shape has a slightly different philosophy. The customer is one of their most important assets, productivity is king, they see a future with no cash and only electronic funds. With cash productivity is low, it is hard to collect cash, count it and bank it, which adds to the cost of doing business. Shape makes it a rule 'no cash payment'.

Soon Pirate's name is on the lips of all ages, hearing about it from friends and family. People go out of their way to visit it, and stay for a beer, food, they even have games. Games you say. Yes, even though it costs the business time and money they have all sorts of free games for people to play.

One day, just before Pirate is ready to move into the almost ready new venue, a multinational brewing giant makes a generous offer to buy the brewery and they want the whole team to stay on.

The sale went ahead, and the brewery is run by the original crew, it grows and keeps prospering, nothing changes other than their success keeps growing. Cash is still an accepted form of payment, even though a multinational company now owns it.

Even though it is at a slower rate, Shape is also growing. They have just renovated their function area and started a club membership program which has been a success (I purchased one with a friend), the beers are fantastic, staff great, customer numbers are slowly increasing but it has never come close to Pirate. And they still don't take cash.

A smart business will weigh up the cost/benefit ratio of certain practices. Take Pirate's example of having free games for customers to play, there is a cost to purchase, maintain and service. However, the benefits are high. Customers stay longer, they have fun and spread the word. Another example, cash requires someone to count and bank but the benefit is that another income stream is open, and sometimes people don't want their partner seeing the bank statement showing that they shouted their mates a round or purchased a carton of limited edition Barely Wine beer.

It's easy to see which is the smart business owner and which one is treading water.