COLUMBIA--Single-digit poll numbers are no big deal to Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards. The North Carolina senator says he's poised to break out of the pack vying for the White House after proving his fund-raising talent.

In the past three months, Edwards out-raised the eight other presidential primary candidates in South Carolina, which hosts the first-in-the-South primary Feb. 3.

MARY ANN CHASTAIN/AP State Sen. Robert Ford (left) helps welcome presidential hopeful U.S. Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., (center) in Columbia on Tuesday.

"We haven't started spending it," Edwards said Tuesday after he opened his South Carolina campaign headquarters near downtown Columbia.

"And I also haven't spent time in places."

Edwards stressed South Carolina's primary was critical to his campaign and said he has focused on organizing and raising money. Now, it's time to switch gears as his opponents -- Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and Sens. John Kerry and Joe Lieberman -- carry the lead and more name recognition.

"Voters need to know who I am," said Edwards, a native of Seneca and the son of a cotton mill worker.

In the next week, he plans to step into the ice cream parlors, homes and restaurants for face time with Democrats in the early voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

According to a poll released Tuesday by the nonpartisan Field Research Institute, Dean was favored by 16 percent of those likely to vote in California's Democratic primary next March.

He was followed closely by Kerry of Massachusetts at 15 percent and Lieberman of Connecticut at 14 percent. Edwards was favored by just 4 percent of likely California voters.

Bill Moore, a political scientist at the College of Charleston, says Edwards' campaign is starting to roll, despite the low poll numbers.

"It's also the dog days of summer when not many people, frankly, pay that much attention to politics," Moore said.

At his campaign headquarters, Edwards tried to convince voters that President Bush is out of touch with average working Americans.

"This president values, honors and respects wealth," Edwards told a crowd of black and white supporters jammed into the tiny office.

"He wants to build barriers, I want to knock them down. He wants to close doors, I want to open doors."