Business Data & Benchmarks · United States
Flooring Store Revenue Benchmark
A flooring store sells carpet, hardwood, laminate, tile and vinyl flooring to homeowners, builders and property managers, usually measuring, quoting and arranging installation through employed or subcontracted crews. Installation, showroom samples and supplier programs shape a trade where the sale is a project rather than a product.
Average Flooring Store Revenue per Year 2022 Economic Census
The 2022 Economic Census counts every floor covering retailer with paid employees, from an independent carpet and tile store to the branches of national flooring chains, and publishes their combined annual receipts, which include installation arranged by the store. Dividing that total by the number of stores gives the average annual revenue per employer establishment shown below.
≈$2,982,000 /year
Average annual gross revenue per employer establishment
10,263
Employer establishments in the United States, 2022
as published $30.6 billion
Combined annual gross revenue of employer establishments, 2022
How this is calculated: about $30.6 billion in combined annual receipts divided by 10,263 employer establishments works out to an average annual revenue of $2,982,000 per employer establishment.
Scope: Floor Covering Retailers, NAICS 449121. The category covers retailers of carpet, tile, wood, laminate and vinyl flooring, including stores that arrange installation. Flooring contractors whose main activity is installation are counted in construction. Classified separately in group 4491: 449110 Furniture Retailers; 449122 Window Treatment Retailers; 449129 All Other Home Furnishings Retailers. Nothing outside that code is counted on this page.
Source US Census Bureau, 2022 Economic Census, Summary Statistics (ECNBASIC): ESTAB, RCPTOT and PAYANN by NAICS · Vintage 2022 Economic Census · Calculation BusinessNES · Accessed September 2026
Five-Year Survival in the Retail Sector Sector-level
Federal data does not track survival for flooring stores specifically. The honest closest measure is the sector that contains them: Retail Trade (NAICS 44-45). Here is the most recent fully observed five-year cohort.
59.8 percent of Retail Trade establishments opened in the year ended March 2020 were still operating five years later. Five-year survival was similar across these two consecutive cohorts: 60.7 percent and 59.8 percent.
Read this as sector base rates, not as a promise for this specific trade. This continuation curve is a broader Retail Trade benchmark, not a survival series specific to flooring stores. The sector contains many business types with different economics, and survival for any one of them can sit above or below the curve. Flooring retail rises and falls with home sales and renovation spending, and a store's survival depends on its installer network and builder relationships more than on the sector trend.
Source US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Business Employment Dynamics, Table 7 · Scope Retail Trade sector, national · Observed through March 2025
Source and definition
Payroll as a Share of Revenue Official data
Payroll divided by receipts, both as published for the same year.
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Annual payroll share of receipts, United States | ≈13% |
Payroll share of receipts, Floor Covering Retailers, United States, 2022 Economic Census.
Approximately 13.0 percent of every revenue dollar goes to annual payroll, a small share because the flooring materials carry most of the price and installation is often done by subcontracted crews paid outside the payroll.
Payroll here excludes benefits, employer taxes and owner compensation, and it excludes materials and payments to subcontracted installers, which together make up most of what a flooring store spends on a job.
Business Scale and Ownership Structure Official data
How large the average establishment is, and whether the population is independent operators or multi-site companies.
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Paid employees per employer establishment | 7.2 |
| Employer establishments per firm | 1.23 |
Scale and ownership, Floor Covering Retailers, United States, 2022 Economic Census.
The average establishment employed about 7.2 people, and the industry averaged 1.2 employer establishments per firm, which confirms that multi-establishment ownership exists in the published population without showing how establishments are distributed across firms. As an illustration, that headcount could cover sales staff, an estimator and an in-house installation crew where the store runs one.
These are arithmetic industry averages. They state the size of the average establishment and show that multi-establishment ownership exists. They do not show the distribution of business sizes and they do not measure market concentration.
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Neighbouring benchmark pages built from the same verified data, plus BusinessNES guides on the same subject.
Data Source Notice
This product uses the Census Bureau Data API but is not endorsed or certified by the Census Bureau.
Figures above are from the 2022 Economic Census reference year, released by the Census Bureau in 2024 and 2025; markets have moved since.
Questions Worth Asking BusinessNES analysis
Flooring Store: what installation and the housing cycle do to a project-based retailer.
Before you rely on this benchmark
- Who installs the floor? Employed installers appear in payroll and give a store control over quality and scheduling, while subcontracted crews keep payroll low and shift cost per job. The choice shapes the payroll share on this page and the store's reputation.
- Retail customers or builders? Homeowners buy one floor at a time at retail margins, while builders and property managers buy volume at negotiated prices. The customer mix decides revenue per job and how exposed a store is to construction cycles.
- How much does the showroom cost? Sample racks, room displays and a large floor space are needed to sell flooring, and suppliers may subsidize displays in exchange for loyalty. Showroom investment and rent are fixed costs a revenue figure does not show.
- Which supplier programs apply? Buying groups, exclusive lines and manufacturer rebates change the cost of goods for identical products, and access to them often depends on volume. Supplier relationships are a business asset invisible in the average.
- Where is the housing market? Flooring demand follows home sales and remodeling, which move with interest rates and consumer confidence. The census year captures one point in that cycle, not a steady level of demand.
- How does online competition play? Online sellers and big-box stores move commodity laminate and vinyl at low prices, while measuring, design help and installation keep projects with a local store. The share of full-service projects decides how a store competes.
Sources and Methodology
Revenue, establishment counts, payroll, employment and firm counts on this page come from the 2022 Economic Census, Summary Statistics, published by the US Census Bureau. Averages and shares are BusinessNES calculations from those published totals, and each one names the two figures it divides.
The Census counts employer establishments, meaning each store with paid staff. Flooring contractors whose main activity is installation are counted in construction, and home centers are a separate category.
The survival curve is a sector-level series from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics and describes the whole Retail Trade sector, not this business type on its own.