Used Merchandise Retailers (U.S.) — NAICS 45951

A short rollup primer for both public-market and private investors. The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) 2022 code 45951 is a NAICS industry (the 5-digit level) covering stores whose main business is selling used, secondhand, and antique goods.

This level equals its one child. NAICS 45951 contains exactly one national industry, 459510 (Used Merchandise Retailers), and nothing else. The two codes describe the same activity — the 5-digit and 6-digit levels are a definitional pass-through. This page gives the rollup's own ground-truth federal figures and a quick orientation; for the full treatment — company-by-company detail, economics, demand drivers, regulation, and outlook — see the 459510 primer.

1. Overview

This is the business of taking in used goods cheaply — through donations, trade-ins, or consignment — then sorting, pricing, and reselling them at a markup. It spans charity thrift stores, for-profit thrift chains, buy-sell-trade shops, consignment and vintage stores, antique dealers, and used-book, used-record, and used-sporting-goods stores.[4] Two features make it distinctive: the raw material is nearly free, so gross margins are structurally high; and supply — not customer demand — is usually the binding constraint, because you sell what walks in the door rather than reordering from a factory. The category is growing faster than retail overall, pushed by value-seeking, sustainability, and a recent squeeze on cheap new imports.[12]

Because 45951 and 459510 are the same thing, everything here applies identically to the child. The rest of this page is deliberately brief.

2. What's inside — the child industries

NAICS 45951 has a single child national industry:

There is no second child to weigh or blend, so the rollup is not an average of several sub-industries — it is 459510. Scope includes thrift shops, consignment shops, antique dealers, used-clothing/furniture/appliance stores, used-book and used-record stores, and used sporting-goods stores.[4] It deliberately excludes several used-goods activities that sit elsewhere in NAICS and therefore are not counted here: pawnshops (finance, NAICS 522299), used cars and parts (441xxx), general merchandise auction houses (455219), and online-only resale marketplaces such as eBay and Poshmark (electronic/nonstore retail).[4] Those exclusions matter for sizing — see Section 3.

3. Size (this level's rollup figures)

Federal ground-truth figures for this NAICS industry (our ingested data), from the 2022 Economic Census:

Our ground-truth file for this level carries only the figures above; it contains no industry-wide growth, margin, employment, or payroll series. Establishment, employee, and payroll counts (roughly 19,466 establishments, ~222,000 employees, and ~$5.46 billion in annual payroll on 2023 County Business Patterns) are reported in the child 459510 primer, and because 45951 = 459510 they apply here without change.[1]

Undercount caveat — treat ~$24.8 billion as a floor. The Economic Census primarily counts employer firms with payroll. It largely misses the huge nonprofit thrift economy (Goodwill's ~150 local organizations reported roughly $8.6 billion in combined revenue in fiscal 2024), the vast layer of individual "nonemployer" resellers (antique-booth vendors, estate-sale operators, eBay/Poshmark flippers), and peer-to-peer channels — plus pawnshop retail sales, which are booked under finance.[1][13][14] Small and individual ownership dominates the long tail, so the true "recommerce" economy is several times larger than the formal store total shown here.

4. Investable universe (where value concentrates)

With a single child, the investable map is exactly that of 459510: few public pure-plays, and the biggest operators are non-investable nonprofits. The largest sellers of used goods in the country are Goodwill and The Salvation Army, which you cannot buy.[13][15] Listed exposure is stock-by-stock — there is no dedicated thrift or resale exchange-traded fund (ETF):

• Savers Value Village (NYSE: SVV) — the closest thing to a profitable store-based pure-play (~$1.5B revenue, ~367 stores); still controlled by Ares Management funds.[6]
• Winmark (Nasdaq: WINA) — a capital-light franchisor of resale brands (Plato's Closet, Play It Again Sports); royalty-and-dividend model.[8]
• The RealReal (Nasdaq: REAL) and ThredUp (Nasdaq: TDUP) — online consignment (luxury and mass-market apparel); higher growth, thinner or still-emerging profits.[9][10]
• eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) — a far broader marketplace and major recommerce channel (buying Depop), technically classified outside 459510 but economically central.[19]

Adjacent, non-core exposure: Etsy (ETSY), pawn operators FirstCash (FCFS) and EZCORP (EZPW), and Naver (owns Poshmark). See the 459510 primer for the full company table and figures.

5. How the money works

Same economics as the child, in brief: near-zero cost of goods → high gross margin (ThredUp posted ~79% gross margin), but processing — sorting, cleaning, grading, pricing, and authenticating — is labor-intensive, so operating margins are far thinner and several online players still lose money.[9][10] Two revenue models coexist: owned inventory (buy/receive the good, resell at a spread — Savers, thrift stores) and consignment/marketplace (take a commission or "take rate" on someone else's sale — The RealReal, ThredUp), plus the franchising model (royalties on franchisee revenue — Winmark). The resale-specific number to watch is the sell-through rate: the share of intake that actually sells before markdown or disposal. Sourcing cost and processing throughput, not customer demand, are the levers that bind.[7]

6. Demand drivers

Unchanged from 459510: value-seeking during budget squeezes; the 2025 tariff/"de minimis" tightening that raised the price of cheap new imports and nudged shoppers toward resale; sustainability and destigmatization (strongest among Gen Z and Millennials); the supply of donations feeding intake; falling friction from AI-assisted listing, pricing, and authentication; and growing brand-run resale programs.[12]

7. Regulation

No single federal license, but a patchwork applies identically at this level: Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) rules on recalled/banned goods; Federal Trade Commission (FTC) rules against deceptive sale of used or reconditioned merchandise; state and local secondhand-dealer/anti-fencing laws (licensing, recordkeeping, holding periods); the federal INFORM Consumers Act for online marketplaces; marketplace-facilitator sales-tax rules; and the tax-exempt/donation-deduction regime that underpins the nonprofit thrift model.[16][17][18][19]

8. Consolidation

This is one of the most fragmented retail industries in the federal data. At this level the top four firms hold just 9.8% of revenue, the top fifty only 32.2%, and the HHI is a mere 39.4 — barely off the floor.[2] A vast long tail of independents plus millions of individual resellers makes up the bulk of activity. The consolidators that stand out are Savers (rolling up regional thrift chains), Winmark (aggregating independents under franchise brands), the two dominant nonprofits, and the digital-resale leaders that are consolidating online (eBay–Depop, Naver–Poshmark).[6][8][19]

9. Risks

Same risk set as the child: dependence on cheap, reliable supply (and rising competition for donated goods); labor- and processing-intensity that resists automation; unproven online profitability; margin compression from shipping, rent, and fees; free peer-to-peer competition (Facebook Marketplace, OfferUp); safety, authenticity, and counterfeit liability; potential reversal of the tariff/donation-deduction tailwinds; and, for public names, controlled-company and leverage structures (Savers remains Ares-controlled).[6][9]

10. How to invest & outlook

Because 45951 = 459510, the playbook is the child's playbook. Public routes: store-based thrift (SVV), capital-light franchising (WINA), online consignment (REAL, TDUP), and broad recommerce (EBAY) — matching the valuation lens to the model (comparable-store sales and cash flow for operators; gross merchandise value, take rate, and fulfillment cost for marketplaces; royalty growth for franchisors). Private routes: operate or franchise a store, resell/arbitrage in the large nonemployer layer, or back platforms, logistics, and software providers — most fast-growing platforms (Vinted, Whatnot, StockX, GOAT) are still private.[6][8]

Outlook (a judgment, not a guarantee): the structural case is constructive — value-seeking, sustainability, tariff-driven price gaps, brand adoption, and AI-reduced friction all support continued gains, with resale growing several times faster than clothing retail overall.[11][12] The caution is that the industry is entering a more competitive phase: fragmentation and free peer-to-peer channels cap pricing power, online profitability is unproven at scale, and competition for used-goods supply pressures the cost side. The durable winners are likely operators with a real edge in the two things that actually bind — cheap, reliable sourcing and efficient processing — plus the capital-light franchisor model and platforms with genuine authentication and scale moats.

For full detail on any of the above, read the 459510 primer — it is the same industry at one more digit of precision.

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Sources

1. U.S. Census Bureau. County Business Patterns, 2023 — NAICS 459510 (establishments, employment, annual payroll). 2025. https://data.census.gov/table/CBP2023.CB2300CBP
2. U.S. Census Bureau. 2022 Economic Census — EC2200SIZECONCEN, Concentration of Largest Firms, NAICS 459510/45951 (receipts, firm count, concentration ratios, HHI). 2024–2025. https://data.census.gov/table/ECNSIZE2022.EC2200SIZECONCEN
3. U.S. Census Bureau. 459510 Used Merchandise Retailers — 2022 NAICS Definition (illustrative examples and exclusions). 2022. https://www.census.gov/naics/?details=459510&input=459510&year=2022
4. Savers Value Village, Inc. Form 10-K for fiscal year ended January 3, 2026 (store counts, average unit retail, sourcing/wholesale, Ares ownership). 2026. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1883313/000188331326000014/svv-20260103.htm
5. Savers Value Village, Inc. FY2024 Form 10-K and Q1 2024 results (nonprofit payments 2020–2024, items processed per store). 2024–2025. https://ir.savers.com/
6. Winmark Corporation. Form 10-K for fiscal year ended December 27, 2025 (1,378 franchises, $1.682B system-wide sales, royalty model). 2026. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/908315/000090831526000007/wina-20251227x10k.htm
7. The RealReal, Inc. Form 10-K for year ended December 31, 2025 (revenue, take rate, active buyers, net loss). 2026. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1573221/000157322126000010/real-20251231.htm
8. ThredUp Inc. Form 10-K for year ended December 31, 2025 (revenue, gross margin, loss from continuing operations). 2026. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1484778/000148477826000007/tdup-20251231.htm
9. ThredUp Inc. 2025 Resale Report (13th annual) — U.S. and global resale-apparel projections. 2025. https://cf-assets-tup.thredup.com/resale_report/2025/ThredUp_Resale_Report_2025.pdf
10. ThredUp Inc. 14th Annual Resale Report — structural competition, AI-driven discovery, 2024 growth, tariff survey. Business Wire, 2026. https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260402799816/en/
11. Goodwill Industries International. 2024 Annual Impact Report (~150 independent local organizations; store network). 2024. https://www.goodwill.org/annual-report/
12. Wikipedia. Goodwill Industries (combined FY2024 revenue ~$8.6 billion; store count). 2025. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodwill_Industries
13. The Salvation Army USA. Thrift Stores (official store list). 2026. https://www.salvationarmyusa.org/thrift-stores/
14. eBay Inc. First-Quarter 2026 Results and Depop Acquisition Update. 2026. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1065088/000106508826000092/exhibit991erebayq12026.htm
15. Streetwise Reports. Pawn Shop Sector Signals Consumer Trends (pawn used-goods retail sales). 2026. https://www.streetwisereports.com/article/2026/06/16/pawn-shop-sector-signals-consumer-trends-as-ezcorp-and-firstcash-holdings-deliver-record-results.html
16. U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. Resellers Guide to Selling Safer Products / Resale & Thrift Stores Information Center. 2025. https://www.cpsc.gov/s3fs-public/254_ResellersGuide_2-5-25.pdf
17. U.S. Federal Trade Commission. Penalty Offenses Concerning the Sale of Used and/or Rebuilt Merchandise. 2022. https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/penalty-offenses/used-rebuilt
18. U.S. Federal Trade Commission. Informing Businesses about the INFORM Consumers Act (effective June 27, 2023). 2023. https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/INFORMAct
19. The Florida Senate. 2024 Florida Statutes, Chapter 538 — Secondhand Dealers and Secondary Metals Recyclers. 2024. https://www.flsenate.gov/Laws/Statutes/2024/Chapter538/All