Profit Margin
2.8%
Net income ÷ total receipts (IRS SOI)
Retail Trade ·NAICS 451
NAICS 451 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores - Industry Benchmarks
$26,751/yr average annual pay, with 1,047 SBA loans on record for NAICS 451.
- 2.8%
- Net margin
- 472K
- Workers employed
- $26,751/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $455M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 451
Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores runs a 2.8% pre-tax net margin - significantly below average, typical of high-volume, low-margin sectors - across 42K establishments employing 472K workers.
- 2.8%
- Pre-tax net margin (IRS SOI)
- 472K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $26,751/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $455M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores
Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores sits inside Retail Trade at a 2.8% net margin (significantly below average, typical of high-volume, low-margin sectors), $81.6B in aggregate receipts across 23,682 returns, averaging $3.4B per establishment.
42,352 establishments employ 471,722 workers (11.1/location) at $26,751/yr average annual pay. California leads employment, followed by Texas and Florida.
Total Receipts
$81.6B
Annual revenue (IRS SOI)
Net Income
$2.3B
Pre-tax net income
Employment
471,722
Total employees (Census CBP)
Avg Payroll / Employee
$26,751/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
42,352
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment decreased by 1,726; establishment count decreased by 135. This comparison uses two published national Census County Business Patterns releases; suppressed fields are omitted rather than estimated.
Where each dollar of Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores revenue goes
Workforce scale
Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores margin vs national reference points
Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores net margin 9.3%
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
23,682 returns 100%
Margin: 2.8% · Receipts: $81.6B
Financial Detail
- Total Tax Returns Filed
- 23,682
- Avg Receipts per Business
- $3.4B
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $12.6B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 11.1
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Book Stores and News Dealers NAICS 4512 | N/A |
| Sporting Goods, Hobby, and Musical Instrument Stores NAICS 4511 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| California | 48,616 |
| Texas | 41,713 |
| Florida | 25,708 |
| New York | 21,086 |
| Pennsylvania | 16,943 |
| Ohio | 15,878 |
| Colorado | 15,845 |
| Illinois | 14,993 |
| North Carolina | 14,773 |
| Michigan | 14,650 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
1,047
Total Loan Volume
$455M
Avg Loan Size
$435K
Jobs Supported
8,550
Program Breakdown
7(a) 889 (85%)
504 158 (15%)
Top SBA Lender
U.S. Bank, National Association
82 loans in this industry
New Business Share
26.5% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 314
2021 431
2022 230
2023 44
2024 22
2025 5
2026 1
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the average revenue for Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores?
$81.6B in total annual receipts across all Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores businesses. Average per business: $3.4B.
How profitable is Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores?
2.8% net profit margin, significantly below average, typical of high-volume, low-margin sectors.
How many businesses are in Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores?
42,352 business establishments. Together they employ 471,722 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores?
$26,751/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 11.1 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores employment?
California leads with 48,616 workers. Texas (41,713) and Florida (25,708) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores receive?
Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores businesses received 1,047 SBA loans totaling $455 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $435K. These loans supported 8,550 jobs at origination. Most lending (85%) 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: Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores reports a higher net margin than 19% of the 79 IRS-tracked industries at the same NAICS detail level. Its Census employment total exceeds 36% of that same 77-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 Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, and Book Stores
- Net margin: 2.8% vs sector. Browse Retail Trade
- 42,352 establishments, 471,722 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 1,047 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 451 · 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.