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cottage industry

American  

noun

  1. the production, for sale, of goods at home, as the making of handicrafts by rural families.

  2. any small-scale, loosely organized industry.

cottage industry British  

noun

  1. an industry in which employees work in their own homes, often using their own equipment

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of cottage industry

First recorded in 1920–25

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.