SIC code for grocery stores: 5411, and the NAICS code 445110

This page is for grocery owners and finance staff filling in a lender, insurer, landlord or supplier form, and for sellers (food distributors, refrigeration and equipment companies, software, payments and merchandising firms) building lists of grocery stores. It covers the SIC and NAICS codes, how to choose between the food store codes, counts from three federal sources, size standards and the public chains.

The grocery codes in both systems

The Census definition of 445110 turns on "a general line of food": canned and frozen foods, fresh fruits and vegetables, and fresh and prepared meats, fish and poultry. The index lists supermarkets, grocery stores, food stores, commissaries and delicatessens that mainly sell groceries and meats.

How SIC 5411 splits in NAICS

The Census concordance divides SIC 5411 into five pieces:

Going the other way, 445110 also takes a piece of SIC 5141, Groceries, General Line: wholesalers that sell general line groceries by the retail method. Specialty food stores had their own SIC codes, which NAICS mostly keeps separate: 5421 meat and fish markets (445240, 445250), 5431 fruit and vegetable markets (445230), 5451 dairy stores and 5499 miscellaneous food stores (445298).

How to choose: the edge cases

The fuel, convenience, deli and delivery rows come from the Census cross-references for 445110. The 2022 revision renamed 445110 from "Supermarkets and Other Grocery (except Convenience) Stores" to "Retailers," replaced 445120 (Convenience Stores) with 445131, and moved gas stations from 447110 to 457110; the core grocery code kept its number. The retail code page covers the rest of sector 44-45.

How many grocery stores there are

Three federal sources count grocery stores, each in its own way:

USDA's store types aren't NAICS: a "supermarket" typically has ten or more checkout lanes with scanners and conveyor belts, and "super stores" include big-box stores, food and drug combos and membership clubs. CBP counts locations with paid employees and uses 2017 codes, so it doesn't yet report 445131 or 457110 by those numbers.

The 445110 count is split between two very different businesses:

A third are small grocers with fewer than five employees, and about 30% are supermarket-sized stores with 50 to 249. The top states are New York (8,320), California (8,044), Florida (3,850), Texas (3,739) and Illinois (2,647). New York's lead comes from small stores: 5,113 of its 8,320 have fewer than five employees, against 2,262 of California's 8,044.

Where the code is used

• Federal supply contracts. Retail codes can't be used to classify a government purchase of goods; the agency uses the manufacturing code for the product. A grocer bidding on a food supply contract is treated as a nonmanufacturer, small if it has 500 or fewer employees and meets 13 CFR 121.406, whatever its receipts.
• SBA loans. The $40.0 million receipts standard for 445110 applies to SBA programs other than federal supply contracts, such as SBA loans.
• Tax returns. The IRS business activity list uses 445110 and 445131 as they are, but folds stores with fuel into 457100 and supercenters into 455210.
• Suppliers, insurers and landlords. They use the code to group you with peers, so give 445110 if you sell a full line of food, even if one location also sells fuel.

Finding grocery companies by code

The USDA's SNAP retailer data is the best free list of individual stores: a downloadable file with every authorized retailer's name, store type, address and coordinates. State food establishment licenses add stores that don't take SNAP. For public chains, EDGAR lists SIC 5411 registrants. The largest by revenue, from their latest 10-K filings:

Walmart, Costco, BJ's Wholesale Club and Dollar General all file under SIC 5331, Variety Stores, so they're missing from a 5411 search. The largest grocery companies page ranks the field across codes. For independent grocers, Bebop can search by description, such as independent supermarkets in Texas with two to ten stores, and explain why each fits.

Worked example

Illustrative example. The company and figures are invented.

Harvest Lane Markets (harvestlane.example) runs four stores. Three are full-line supermarkets; the fourth is a small store with fuel pumps where fuel brings in most of the revenue.

Its primary code is 445110, and the fuel store, where it's reported as its own establishment, is 457110. Its SIC code is 5411 for all four, because SIC put convenience stores with fuel in 5411 too.

Its average annual receipts over five years are $38.4 million, under the $40.0 million standard for an SBA loan. A food supply bid to a federal prison would be judged differently: under the nonmanufacturer rule, Harvest Lane's 310 employees are under 500, so it can bid as small if it supplies products made by small manufacturers or SBA has granted a waiver for the item.

Next step: see who leads the field, across both grocery and variety store codes, in the list of the largest grocery companies.