Business Data & Benchmarks · United States

Formal Wear and Costume Rental Revenue Benchmark

Rental of formal clothing and costumes to consumers, from tuxedos and gowns to theatrical and seasonal outfits.

NAICS 532281, 2022 editionUnited States data by defaultSources and dates shown

Average Formal Wear and Costume Rental Revenue per Year 2022 Economic Census

The 2022 Economic Census counts every formal wear and costume rental business with paid employees and publishes their combined annual receipts. Dividing one by the other gives the average annual revenue per employer establishment below.

≈$1,025,000 /year

Average annual gross revenue per employer establishment

702

Employer establishments in the United States, 2022

as published $0.7 billion

Combined annual gross revenue of employer establishments, 2022

How this is calculated: about $0.7 billion in combined annual receipts divided by 702 employer establishments works out to an average annual revenue of $1,025,000 per employer establishment. This is a small published population, so the average rests on very few businesses and a single large operator moves it more than it would elsewhere.

Scope: Formal Wear and Costume Rental, NAICS 532281. Classified separately in group 5322: 532210 Consumer Electronics and Appliances Rental; 532282 Video Tape and Disc Rental; 532283 Home Health Equipment Rental, and 2 further codes. 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 July 2026

Employer Establishments at Year Five Smaller cohort

Consumer Goods Rental, NAICS 5322, the 2018 starting count compared with the count of five-year-old establishments in 2023.

48.6%the year-five count as a share of the starting count

Five-year establishment continuation benchmarkLine chart of industry continuation: 80.6 percent at 1 year, 64.5 percent at 2 years, 53.5 percent at 3 years, 52.5 percent at 4 years, 48.6 percent at 5 years. 727 establishments first reported paid employment in 2018; BusinessNES calculation from Census BDS.100%75%50%25%0%2014-2018 cohort range: 41.4 to 50.6 percentStart: 100 percent, the starting count1 year: 80.6 percent of the starting count2 years: 64.5 percent of the starting count3 years: 53.5 percent of the starting count4 years: 52.5 percent of the starting count5 years: 48.6 percent of the starting count80.664.553.552.548.6Start1 year2 years3 years4 years5 years727 establishments first reported paid employment in 2018; BusinessNES calculation from Census BDS.
Five years on, this industry group counted about 49 establishments aged five for every 100 that first reported paid employment in 2018. Census compares counts by age rather than following the same businesses, so read it as a broad continuation indicator for the industry group, not as a tracked survival rate.

Across the 2014 to 2018 cohorts, five-year results ranged from 41.4 to 50.6 percent. This benchmark covers Consumer Goods Rental, NAICS 5322, as a whole, and this category accounts for 702 of the 15,974 employer establishments in it. A count by age is not a survival rate, because the figures compare two headcounts rather than follow one set of businesses.

Payroll as a Share of Revenue Official data

Payroll divided by receipts, both as published for the same year.

MeasureValue
Annual payroll share of receipts, United States≈19%

Payroll share of receipts, Formal Wear and Costume Rental, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

Approximately 19.0 percent of every revenue dollar goes to annual payroll. Fitting, cleaning and returns are staffed work, while the garments themselves are inventory that earns across many rentals.

Payroll here excludes benefits, employer taxes and owner compensation, and it excludes the garments, their cleaning and their replacement, which is where much of the money in this trade goes.

Business Scale and Ownership Structure Official data

How large the average establishment is, and whether the population is independent operators or multi-site companies.

MeasureValue
Paid employees per employer establishment6.5
Employer establishments per firm1.48

Scale and ownership, Formal Wear and Costume Rental, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

The average establishment employed about 6.5 people, and the industry counted 1.5 employer establishments per firm.

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.

Questions Worth Asking BusinessNES analysis

Formal Wear and Costume Rental: questions the benchmark cannot answer.

Before you rely on this benchmark

  • How many times does one garment rent before it retires? Much of the model rests on rentals per item. A tuxedo that goes out thirty times and one that goes out five have entirely different economics.
  • How concentrated is demand in a few weeks? Proms, weddings and Halloween compress much of the year into short peaks, and peak staffing sits on top of a base that continues through quieter periods.
  • What does cleaning and repair cost per turn? Garments come back needing cleaning, pressing and repair before they can go out again. That turnaround sits between rentals, and only damage beyond ordinary wear is usually recoverable from the customer.
  • What share of the rack is idle? Sizes and styles that stop renting still occupy space and capital, and nothing on the revenue line shows how much of the rack is idle.
  • Who does the alterations? Fitting is what separates rental from retail here, and in-house tailoring is both a cost and the reason customers return.

Explore More on BusinessNES

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.

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 staffed shop rather than each company.