Local sellers could make funds simpler to just accept, however discovering new clients and giving them a purpose to return is a problem. Marketplaces can carry demand, however sellers might must take care of commissions, competitors for visibility, and separate instruments for managing buyer relationships.
Block, the father or mother firm of Square and Cash App, noticed this hole between its vendor and client networks. In the final quarter of 2025, it introduced the 2 networks collectively via Neighborhoods, a feature in Cash App. It lets clients uncover and comply with local companies that use Square, place orders via Cash App, and earn Local Cash rewards that encourage them to return.
Block mentioned in August 2026 that Neighborhoods had added 30,000 sellers, almost ten occasions the quantity in June. As of June 2026, taking part sellers represented $1 billion in annualized gross fee quantity, up greater than 220% from March. Block additionally reported that spending by followers accounted for a mean of 10% of sellers’ gross fee quantity after three quarters on the platform.
Tearsheet Managing Editor Sara Khairi spoke with Owen Jennings, Block’s Business Lead, about why the corporate linked Square and Cash App now in spite of everything these years, how Neighborhoods modifications the economics of buyer acquisition and retention for local sellers, and why Block describes it as an “anti-marketplace.”
Q: What have been the most important obstacles – technical, organizational, data-related, or in any other case – to connecting Square and Cash App, and what modified that allowed Neighborhoods to occur now?
Owen Jennings, Block: Connecting Square and Cash App meant bringing collectively our largest networks whereas making the expertise easy for sellers and clients. For sellers, the expertise wanted to work via the Square instruments they already use. And for purchasers, it wanted to create a significant purpose to have interaction with local companies via Cash App.
…
