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Synonyms

shopkeeper

American  
[shop-kee-per] / ˈʃɒpˌki pər /

noun

  1. a retail merchant or tradesman; a person who owns or operates a small store or shop.

shopkeeper British  
/ ˈʃɒpˌkiːpə /

noun

  1. a person who owns or manages a shop or small store

"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

Other Word Forms

Etymology

Origin of shopkeeper

First recorded in 1520–30; shop + keeper

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Just across the street at the Ali Bin Ali grocery store, a shopkeeper was more apprehensive as he arranged boxes of Iranian dates and nuts.

From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 1, 2026

With these five simple words, a Hindu man who stood up for a Muslim shopkeeper has been catapulted to fame and become an unlikely hero in India.

From BBC • Feb. 12, 2026

Majid, a mobile shopkeeper in his thirties, said this time felt different.

From Barron's • Jan. 9, 2026

Pakistani shopkeeper Ehsanullah Himmat, 21, had travelled to the southern Afghan city of Kandahar with his family to attend a relative's wedding, but "now we cannot go back to our home", he said.

From Barron's • Jan. 4, 2026

“Feel free to browse,” the shopkeeper says, pushing up her glasses, then looking back at her own book.

From "The Queen of Water" by Laura Resau

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.