Did you know that the State of North Carolina has no single general business license?  Businesses must ensure compliance with all requirements set by the state for the work their business does.   Some businesses may be subject to several state requirements while others may not be subject to any. There are over 700 regulatory, state issued, and occupational licenses and permits in North Carolina.  Oh wait!  It gets better, there may be a local license required for your business too.

The fees from these licenses are typically flat fees and are collected by each individual county.  The Department of Revenue does not collect individual license data, but does follow overall collections.  Across North Carolina, counties collected $8.144 million in occupational license fees.  See the list of county collections below.

Total License Collections
Cumberland  $ 921,773
Gaston  733,650
New Hanover  647,094
Cabarrus  594,165
Orange  547,738
Wake  446,298
Currituck  414,475
Mecklenburg  382,750
Forsyth  354,994
Wilkes  340,482
Camden  337,938
Nash  274,001
Guilford  198,343
Randolph  116,067
Macon  111,296
Rowan  86,697
Onslow  84,787
Iredell  79,461
Durham  74,611
Buncombe  72,950
Brunswick                   70,846
Alamance  70,064
Craven  63,424
Carteret  56,661
Union  51,003
Johnston  50,385
Catawba  49,830
Robeson  48,174
Rockingham  47,737
Stanly  40,615
Stokes  39,485
Washington  38,875
Pitt  38,831
Edgecombe  38,364
Dare  35,377
Surry  32,391
Haywood  29,160
Halifax  25,723
Duplin  25,449
Wilson  23,623
Sampson  22,860
Person  22,810
Burke  22,445
Franklin  21,685
Jackson  21,283
Lenoir  21,169
Hertford  20,862
Cleveland  20,235
Yadkin  19,320
Davie  18,566
Chatham                   18,205
Henderson  17,392
Richmond  15,205
Alexander  12,660
Rutherford  12,395
Cherokee  11,040
Swain  10,600
Madison  10,440
Montgomery  10,250
Pasquotank  9,580
Avery  8,640
Ashe  7,991
Vance  7,677
Mitchell  7,080
Perquimans  6,726
Granville  6,710
Northampton  6,455
Bertie  5,935
Chowan  5,400
Martin  4,920
Scotland  4,823
Clay  4,500
Watauga  4,425
Graham  4,000
Alleghany  3,980
Bladen  3,718
Polk  3,525
Hyde  3,268
Yancey  2,466
Gates  2,060
Pamlico  1,904
Tyrrell  1,196
Jones  1,065
Anson  915
Caswell  705

*All Information on occupational licenses can be found at the Dept. of Commerce and data was supplied from the Dept. of Revenue