Employment
11,380
Total employees (Census CBP)
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services ·NAICS 541490
NAICS 541490 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Other Specialized Design Services - Industry Benchmarks
$73,308/yr average annual pay, with 435 SBA loans on record for NAICS 541490.
- 14.0%
- Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services sector margin
- 11K
- Workers employed
- $73,308/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $167M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 541490
California leads Other Specialized Design Services activity nationally. IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at this NAICS level, but the broader Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services sector runs a 14.0% net margin.
- 14.0%
- Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services sector margin (IRS SOI)
- 11K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $73,308/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $167M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Other Specialized Design Services
Other Specialized Design Services sits inside Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services, a sector that runs a 14.0% net margin overall.
3,469 establishments employ 11,380 workers (3.3/location) at $73,308/yr average annual pay. California leads employment, followed by Florida and Texas.
Avg Payroll / Employee
$73,308/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
3,469
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment decreased by 534; establishment count increased by 62. 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)
- $834.2M
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 3.3
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| California | 2,614 |
| Florida | 1,540 |
| Texas | 638 |
| Illinois | 317 |
| Maryland | 106 |
| Arizona | 105 |
| Oregon | 97 |
| Nevada | 74 |
| Missouri | 72 |
| Maine | 40 |
Showing top 10 of 49 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
435
Total Loan Volume
$167M
Avg Loan Size
$383K
Jobs Supported
2,372
Program Breakdown
7(a) 397 (91%)
504 38 (9%)
Top SBA Lender
The Huntington National Bank
31 loans in this industry
New Business Share
21.4% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 47
2021 40
2022 60
2023 85
2024 85
2025 107
2026 11
Frequently Asked Questions
How profitable is Other Specialized Design Services?
IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at the NAICS 541490 level. California leads this industry nationally. The broader Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services sector runs a 14.0% net margin (IRS SOI 2023).
How many businesses are in Other Specialized Design Services?
3,469 business establishments. Together they employ 11,380 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Other Specialized Design Services?
$73,308/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 3.3 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Other Specialized Design Services employment?
California leads with 2,614 workers. Florida (1,540) and Texas (638) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Other Specialized Design Services receive?
Other Specialized Design Services businesses received 435 SBA loans totaling $167 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $383K. These loans supported 2,372 jobs at origination. Most lending (91%) 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 18% of that same 801-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.
- Tobacco Manufacturing 11,362
- Dance Companies 11,341
- Fertilizer (Mixing Only) Manufacturing 11,442
Benchmarking Other Specialized Design Services
- No margin data, check the parent industry. Browse Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services
- 3,469 establishments, 11,380 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 435 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 541490 · 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.