Profit Margin
2.7%
Net income ÷ total receipts (IRS SOI)
Wholesale Trade ·NAICS 4248
NAICS 4248 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers - Industry Benchmarks
$77,591/yr average annual pay, with 423 SBA loans on record for NAICS 4248.
- 2.7%
- Net margin
- 215K
- Workers employed
- $77,591/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $191M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 4248
Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers runs a 2.7% pre-tax net margin - significantly below average, typical of high-volume, low-margin sectors - across 5K establishments employing 215K workers.
- 2.7%
- Pre-tax net margin (IRS SOI)
- 215K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $77,591/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $191M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers
Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers sits inside Wholesale Trade at a 2.7% net margin (significantly below average, typical of high-volume, low-margin sectors), $91.1B in aggregate receipts across 3,826 returns, averaging $23.8B per establishment.
4,859 establishments employ 215,170 workers (44.3/location) at $77,591/yr average annual pay. California leads employment, followed by New York and Illinois.
Total Receipts
$91.1B
Annual revenue (IRS SOI)
Net Income
$2.5B
Pre-tax net income
Employment
215,170
Total employees (Census CBP)
Avg Payroll / Employee
$77,591/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
4,859
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 4,433; establishment count increased by 45. This comparison uses two published national Census County Business Patterns releases; suppressed fields are omitted rather than estimated.
Where each dollar of Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers revenue goes
Workforce scale
Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers margin vs national reference points
Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers net margin 9.1%
Cross-industry median (5%)
p25/median/p75 = 3%/5%/8%
Business Structure Breakdown
How businesses in this industry are legally structured (IRS SOI)
C Corporation
3,826 returns 100%
Margin: 2.7% · Receipts: $91.1B
Financial Detail
- Total Tax Returns Filed
- 3,826
- Avg Receipts per Business
- $23.8B
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $16.7B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 44.3
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Beer and Ale Merchant Wholesalers NAICS 42481 | N/A |
| Wine and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers NAICS 42482 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| California | 22,915 |
| New York | 15,542 |
| Illinois | 8,393 |
| Georgia | 7,138 |
| North Carolina | 6,207 |
| Ohio | 6,129 |
| Michigan | 5,672 |
| New Jersey | 5,593 |
| Washington | 5,585 |
| Wisconsin | 4,969 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
423
Total Loan Volume
$191M
Avg Loan Size
$451K
Jobs Supported
3,054
Program Breakdown
7(a) 392 (93%)
504 31 (7%)
Top SBA Lender
Manufacturers and Traders Trust Company
28 loans in this industry
New Business Share
27.4% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 48
2021 61
2022 65
2023 74
2024 79
2025 83
2026 13
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the average revenue for Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers?
$91.1B in total annual receipts across all Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers businesses. Average per business: $23.8B.
How profitable is Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers?
2.7% net profit margin, significantly below average, typical of high-volume, low-margin sectors.
How many businesses are in Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers?
4,859 business establishments. Together they employ 215,170 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers?
$77,591/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 44.3 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers employment?
California leads with 22,915 workers. New York (15,542) and Illinois (8,393) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers receive?
Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers businesses received 423 SBA loans totaling $191 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $451K. These loans supported 3,054 jobs at origination. Most lending (93%) came through the SBA 7(a) program.
Comparable industry benchmarks
These links are calculated from the current national dataset. They are comparison paths, not recommendations or evidence that businesses operate alike.
How this ranks: Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers reports a higher net margin than 24% of the 126 IRS-tracked industries at the same NAICS detail level. Its Census employment total exceeds 53% of that same 259-industry cohort. Calculated by ranking this industry's reported value against every other industry at the same NAICS digit-level, not the whole dataset: comparing a 6-digit detail industry to a 2-digit sector would mix incompatible scales.
Closest reported net margins
Same NAICS detail level, ordered by the smallest difference in reported IRS pre-tax margin.
Closest workforce scale
Same NAICS detail level, ordered by the smallest difference in reported Census employment.
Benchmarking Beer, Wine, and Distilled Alcoholic Beverage Merchant Wholesalers
- Net margin: 2.7% vs sector. Browse Wholesale Trade
- 4,859 establishments, 215,170 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 423 SBA loans on record. SBA lending rankings
Disclaimer: Public IRS/Census data, not financial or tax advice. See our full disclaimer.
Sources: IRS Statistics of Income (SOI) Business Tax Statistics · Census Bureau County Business Patterns 2023
NAICS 4248 · Data year: 2023
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, which released its 2023 County Business Patterns dataset in June 2025, PlainBizBench benchmarks 2,002 U.S. industries against Internal Revenue Service Statistics of Income data. See our methodology for the full compilation process.
Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, County Business Patterns / SUSB Industry employment scale, payroll, and firm-size benchmarks · 2023
Every figure on PlainBizBench is rendered directly from federal source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page aggregates profit-margin, payroll, entity-type, and SBA-lending benchmarks for this industry, live from the dataset. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.
Disclaimer: Public IRS/Census data, not financial or tax advice. See our full disclaimer.