When thinking about who owns crypto, someone who works in finance or a computer-dominated field probably comes to mind. But these days, someone just as likely to own crypto is a foreman. Construction makes up 13% of U.S. crypto holders who work for a living, and what they do with crypto looks a lot like average, everyday transactions. From sending to family and friends to spending at the gas station, they move money where they need it most, even on a Sunday when the bank is closed.
Tradespeople often own everything that they work with. Your tools, your truck, your book of business and sometimes even the company itself. Crypto works the same way but in the form of money. Money used to live under your mattress, then in a bank, and now, it lives on the internet. A place where you can hold it and reach it at any hour of the day.
You may have more peers exploring the world of crypto than you'd think. In a single year, 12 million more Americans bought crypto for the first time. One in four adults now owns crypto, over 67 million people, up from one in five last year. A lot of that growth happened among tradespeople.
Two business owners in the industry are demonstrating what this looks like in practice so that you can learn how to use it for yourself, too.
A Contractor's Time is Important
Jake owns Marin Design & Build in California. After he left the fire service to get his life and schedule back, he found that owning a business gave him just that. He now does school pickup and drop-off for his kids without any hassle and has time to be a full-time dad plus a full-time business owner. That same feeling of freedom came over him when he started researching crypto.
Crypto excited him the same way owning a business did, but instead of looking for control over his schedule, he was looking for control over his finances. With crypto, Jake can decide when and where he can access it at any time of day, and most importantly, he decides what happens to it. Whether it’s for investing, paying someone for the work they did, or for retirement, Jake can make the call for whatever works best for him. He refers to crypto as autonomy over his own life and finances, and he treats it as part of the future he’s building for his kids.
Just like how you already own your tools, your truck, your reputation, crypto lets you hold your money the same way, directly and on your own terms.
And Jake isn’t alone. We found that financial independence ranked as the number one benefit for 54% of holders, up from 49% a year ago. The share who pointed to a feeling of security and control over their own money climbed to 42% from 35% over the past twelve months.
A Plumber Who Put it on the Books
Clayton is a master plumber based out of Texas, where he runs his family’s plumbing company, Yell4George, built by his grandfather in the late 1940s. In 2013, Clayton started reading about crypto after hearing how it generally works through a podcast. After a year of doing his own research, he decided to enter the crypto space in 2014 and has been holding it ever since. Over time, crypto naturally became integrated into his company, and he uses it to help run his business efficiently.
The company keeps crypto on the books the same way it keeps any account it expects to grow, and that growth has gone back into the business and to the people who work there. As the 80th anniversary of his family’s company approaches, the plan to hold crypto remains strong.
Clayton’s customers also have the freedom to choose how they’d like to pay for the company's services, as he currently accepts crypto alongside cards, checks and cash. Offering crypto at checkout to his customers costs him nothing and gives customers more choice, just like the card reader did years ago.
Clayton’s business isn’t the only one that does this. In fact, among construction workers who hold crypto, 37% also accept it as business payments, and more than half of all holders expect crypto to be part of their financial planning in the next two to three years. Clayton got ahead of the curve by starting the conversation with his family over a decade ago.
Paying Your Workers is Part of it Too
Payroll is starting to look different too, as crypto holders who own businesses look for ways to pay their employees faster. When a job wraps on a Friday, the crew wants to be paid for the work done, not wait a few days for it to clear. Crypto moves the moment you send it, any day, any hour. And the people on your work sites are increasingly the ones already comfortable getting paid this way.
More than a third of all crypto holders plan to offer crypto as a payment option to their employees in the next year. That makes it an operational decision with a long-term payoff, well past any single paycheck. If your trade runs on subcontractors, you already know how valuable faster payment terms are.
Why This Matters for Construction
Construction has always been quick to take on tools that give a crew more control and speed up the work, and crypto is starting to fall into this same category. Jake and Clayton’s stories show that there's no single way to use it. Jake holds onto it because it gives him a say over his own money, the same way running his own company gives him a say over his time. Clayton keeps it on the company's books and lets his customers pay with it if they'd like. Neither of them had a playbook for this. They did their own research, decided how it fit into the way they wanted to run their businesses, and went from there.
That doesn't mean the worries disappear. Nearly three-quarters (72%) of holders remain cautious about scams and security, even as 77% say their overall experience has been good. Ask them what would make them trust it more, and they'll tell you. They want companies to be upfront, hear from regular people who've actually used it, and have clearer rules to follow. Any tradesperson who's worked under licensing and inspection knows that instinct. You earn the job by showing your work, and crypto's users are asking the same of the industry they're buying into.
It's worth considering where crypto might fit into your business. That might mean holding it or setting up the shop to accept it from customers who want alternate ways to pay. It might mean a faster way to pay a crew spread across job sites. Clayton started this conversation with his family more than a decade ago, and his shop is about to hit 80 years in business. The tradespeople you'll be hiring next already know what a crypto wallet is. The question now is whether your business will meet them there.
