Back to School with Square’s College Town Rankings

School is back in session. College students have returned to their dorms and quads, football season is underway, and many high school seniors are thinking about where they’ll head next fall. With that comes the annual wave of college rankings — lists that promise to tell you which schools are the “best” and why.

Publications like U.S. News and Forbes base their rankings on a wide range of measures: test scores, graduation rates, student debt totals, faculty salaries, and more. Yet, we know that just as important as academic programs are the environments in which students spend their college years: their local college towns.

We were inspired by Bloomberg’s 2016 analysis, which ranked college towns according to how deeply their local economies are intertwined with their resident schools.^ Bloomberg highlighted towns where universities play an outsized role in shaping everyday commerce and culture; our updated rankings, based on Square data from September 2025, offer a new snapshot of commerce trends in these locales.

If you’re looking for a lively Saturday football tailgate, College Station/Bryan, home to Texas A&M University, is the place for you. Now that football season has kicked off, the local economy on Saturdays has more than doubled, up 139% from summer levels. Not far behind is State College, home to Penn State University, where Saturday spending has surged 94%. Surprisingly, recent national championship winner University of Michigan in Ann Arbor saw the lowest commerce surge on Saturdays.

If you identify with the old adage, the early bird catches the worm, you would be in good company in Gainesville (University of Florida), Blacksburg (Virginia Tech), and Columbia (University of Missouri), where over a tenth of food and drink transactions take place between the wee hours of 6 and 8 am. If you’re looking for a quieter morning, try Ithaca (Cornell University).

While Ithaca might be quiet in the morning, you can bet the oat milk is flowing. If you’re after a dash of that creamy, sweet alt-milk in your pre-lecture coffee, you’d be among the majority in Ithaca (Cornell University) and Columbia (University of Missouri).

Thinking of tattooing some test answers on your arm? Or maybe a flower? Go with a friend from Ithaca (Cornell University), Blacksburg (Virginia Tech), or State College (Penn State University), the towns with the highest share of tattoo parlor transactions.

It’s 3 in the morning: do you need a french fry? If the answer is yes, check out Ann Arbor (University of Michigan), Urbana/Champaign (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign), and Bloomington (Indiana University), where at least one in every ten late-night food order includes french fries.

For the most affordable haircuts (important on a college budget), consider Blacksburg (Virginia Tech), College Station/Bryan (Texas A&M University), or Lawrence (University of Kansas), where the average cut is under $35.

Know of a great college town we should analyze next? Keep in touch and let us know on LinkedIn.