WHOLESALE AND RETAIL TRADE

This section includes wholesale and retail sale (i.e. sale without transformation) of any type of physical goods, and rendering services incidental to the sale of merchandise. Goods are physical, produced objects for which a demand exists, over which ownership rights can be established and whose ownership can be transferred from one unit to another by engaging in transactions on markets. Wholesaling and retailing are the final steps in the distribution of merchandise. For this purpose, ancillary activities are carried out, which is considered to include a number of usual operations (or manipulations) associated with trade, without transforming the goods. These operations (or manipulations) include, for example, sorting, grading and assembling of goods, mixing of goods (e.g. sand), bottling (with or without preceding bottle cleaning), packaging, breaking bulk and repacking for distribution in smaller lots, storage (whether or not frozen or chilled). If not carried out as usual operations (or manipulations) associated with trade, the mentioned activities can be carried out as principal, secondary or ancillary activities in other sections of the SSIC. Wholesale is the resale of new and used goods to retailers, business-to-business trade, such as to industrial, commercial, institutional or professional users, or resale to other wholesalers, or involves acting as an agent or broker in buying merchandise for, or selling merchandise to, such persons or companies. The principal types of businesses included are merchant wholesalers, i.e. wholesalers who take title to the goods they sell, such as wholesale merchants or jobbers, industrial distributors, exporters, importers, and cooperative buying associations, sales branches and sales offices (but not retail stores) that are maintained by manufacturing or mining units apart from their plants or mines for the purpose of marketing their products and that do not merely take orders to be filled by direct shipments from the plants or mines. Also included are intermediation service activities, such as the activities of merchandise and commodity brokers, commission merchants and agents and assemblers, cooperative associations primarily engaged in the marketing of farm products. If the wholesaler does not assume ownership of the goods he trades, he must be classified in group 461. If the wholesaler assumes ownership of the goods, even if he is acting on behalf of a third party, he must be classified in groups 462-469.Wholesalers frequently physically assemble, sort and grade goods in large lots, break bulk, repack and redistribute in smaller lots, for example pharmaceuticals; store, refrigerate, deliver and install goods, engage in sales promotion for their customers and label design. Retailing is the resale of new and used goods to the general public for personal or household consumption or utilisation, whatever the channel, in shops, stalls, department stores, mail-order houses, door-to-door sales persons, hawkers, consumer cooperatives, auction houses etc. It includes the sale of goods via showroom (where the exposed goods can be bought), via ephemeral points of sale (e.g. pop up stores) as well as in automated retail shops. Most retailers take title to the goods they sell, but some act as agents for a principal and sell either on consignment or on a commission basis. Retailing via mail order or internet is classified according to the type of goods sold. The distinction between wholesale and retail is not based on the quantity of goods sold, as wholesale sales may be made on a unit basis, just as retail sales may be made on a bulk basis. Instead, the primary distinction between wholesale and retail is the type of customer. Wholesale usually involves business as customers, and retail trade usually sell to individual customers. If a trader sells to both business and household customers without distinction, and it is practically impossible to distinguish the majority type of customers, then it is recommended to treat the seller as a retailer. Wholesale/retail trade would be considered as non-specialised trade (i.e. classified under Group 469 or 471) if the economic unit’s sales covers at least 5 SSIC classes and no single product contributes more than 50% of the firm’s value added. Otherwise, the economic unit would be considered to engage in specialised trade (i.e. classified under Groups 462 to 466 or 472 to 477), and when there are multiple products that contribute similarly to the firm's value-added, the usual top-down approach applies. This section also includes: - transit trade activities consisting of buying commodities, moving them from one customs territory to another or from one point to another in the same customs territory and finally selling them. Transit trade represents a triangular transaction in which the transit trader carries out export and import transactions between two or more different countries outside his own economic territory. The transit trader owns the commodity during its transport (difference to intermediaries that do not take ownership of the intermediated goods); - sale of food and/or beverages via vending machines (whether prepared by the vending machine or otherwise) or automated points of sale