Employment
202,988
Total employees (Census CBP)
Retail Trade ·NAICS 44821
NAICS 44821 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Shoe Stores - Industry Benchmarks
$23,375/yr average annual pay, with 108 SBA loans on record for NAICS 44821.
- 4.2%
- Retail Trade sector margin
- 203K
- Workers employed
- $23,375/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $36M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 44821
California leads Shoe Stores activity nationally. IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at this NAICS level, but the broader Retail Trade sector runs a 4.2% net margin.
- 4.2%
- Retail Trade sector margin (IRS SOI)
- 203K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $23,375/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $36M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Shoe Stores
Shoe Stores sits inside Retail Trade, a sector that runs a 4.2% net margin overall.
18,177 establishments employ 202,988 workers (11.2/location) at $23,375/yr average annual pay. California leads employment, followed by Texas and Florida.
Avg Payroll / Employee
$23,375/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
18,177
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 584; establishment count decreased by 123. This comparison uses two published national Census County Business Patterns releases; suppressed fields are omitted rather than estimated.
Workforce scale
Financial Detail
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $4.7B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 11.2
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Shoe Stores NAICS 448210 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| California | 28,097 |
| Texas | 21,124 |
| Florida | 15,791 |
| New York | 14,364 |
| Illinois | 7,661 |
| North Carolina | 6,860 |
| Pennsylvania | 6,730 |
| New Jersey | 6,388 |
| Ohio | 5,871 |
| Virginia | 5,320 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
108
Total Loan Volume
$36M
Avg Loan Size
$330K
Jobs Supported
664
Program Breakdown
7(a) 102 (94%)
504 6 (6%)
Top SBA Lender
The Huntington National Bank
14 loans in this industry
New Business Share
26.9% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (5 yrs)
2020 34
2021 42
2022 23
2023 5
2024 4
Frequently Asked Questions
How profitable is Shoe Stores?
IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at the NAICS 44821 level. California leads this industry nationally. The broader Retail Trade sector runs a 4.2% net margin (IRS SOI 2023).
How many businesses are in Shoe Stores?
18,177 business establishments. Together they employ 202,988 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Shoe Stores?
$23,375/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 11.2 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Shoe Stores employment?
California leads with 28,097 workers. Texas (21,124) and Florida (15,791) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Shoe Stores receive?
Shoe Stores businesses received 108 SBA loans totaling $36 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $330K. These loans supported 664 jobs at origination. Most lending (94%) 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: Its Census employment total exceeds 78% of that same 551-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 workforce scale
Same NAICS detail level, ordered by the smallest difference in reported Census employment.
- Civic and Social Organizations 201,423
- Advertising Agencies 200,465
- All Other Ambulatory Health Care Services 207,091
Benchmarking Shoe Stores
- No margin data, check the parent industry. Browse Retail Trade
- 18,177 establishments, 202,988 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 108 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 44821 · 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.