retailing

Pluralretailings

1. 1
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The business of selling goods and services directly to the people who consume them.

   Decades in retailing taught her exactly what shoppers want.

   The company shifted from wholesale supply to direct retailing during the pandemic.

   Similarsales, selling, merchandising

   Oppositewholesaling

   Note

   A noun that both names a trade and can be counted. It is usually uncountable (decades in retailing), but Meehans' Monthly (1896) speaks of "fine fruit for retailings." Today it pairs with words for the sales channel, such as online retailing or High Street retailing. It also appears in lists with procurement, warehousing and transportation, as the last link in the supply chain. Plain retail names the same business.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle of retail.

   The chain is retailing its newest line exclusively online.

   Several vendors are retailing handmade goods at the market.

   Note

   The -ing form does double duty. In "is retailing its newest line" it is a progressive verb, and as a gerund it still takes an object: retailing handmade goods cuts out the middleman. When it drops the object and names the trade, it has become the noun for the business. It also carries retail's older figurative meaning of passing on news or rumors, as in retailing gossip to the neighbors.

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