wholesale
Americannoun
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wholesales
plural
adjective
-
of, relating to, or engaged in sale by wholesale.
-
extensive; broadly indiscriminate.
wholesale discharge of workers.
- Synonyms:
- promiscuous, undiscriminating, inclusive, thorough, comprehensive, far-reaching
adverb
-
in a wholesale way; on wholesale terms.
I can get it for you wholesale.
-
in large quantities; on a large scale, especially without discrimination.
Wild horses were slaughtered wholesale.
verb (used with or without object)
-
wholesales,
present (3rd person singular)
-
wholesaled,
past participle, past
-
wholesaling
present participle
noun
-
the business of selling goods to retailers in larger quantities than they are sold to final consumers but in smaller quantities than they are purchased from manufacturers Compare retail
-
-
in large quantities
-
at wholesale prices
-
adjective
-
of, relating to, or engaged in such business
-
made, done, etc, on a large scale or without discrimination
adverb
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
wholesalesimple
-
wholesalessimple
-
have wholesaledperfect
-
has wholesaledperfect
-
am wholesalingprogressive
-
are wholesalingprogressive
-
is wholesalingprogressive
-
have been wholesalingperfect progressive
-
has been wholesalingperfect progressive
Past
-
wholesaledsimple
-
had wholesaledperfect
-
was wholesalingprogressive
-
were wholesalingprogressive
-
had been wholesalingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of wholesale
1375–1425; late Middle English, from the phrase by hole sale in gross; see whole, sale
Explanation
Use the adjective wholesale to describe something that's done on a big, broad scale, like wholesale changes made by a new government that affect an entire country. It's pretty common to see the phrase "wholesale destruction," especially when historians are talking about the overwhelming effects of war or ecological disasters. When wholesale is a verb, it has a very different meaning — to sell things in bulk, usually to someone who is going to sell it again at a higher retail price. The earliest meaning of the word was "in large quantities," combining whole and sale into the phrase "by whole sale."
Vocabulary lists containing wholesale
The Things They Carried
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City of Bones
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"Simplexity" by Jeffrey Kluger
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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.
See Examples For:
Meanwhile, some energy companies bought wholesale gas suppliers, expanding their ability to transport, store and sell their output to different markets.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 17, 2026
Take the case of Laurence Stallings and Truman Talley’s “The First World War,” released in 1934 by the Fox Film Corp. and described by Variety as “a celluloid anthology of the world’s greatest wholesale slaughter.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 14, 2026
Lower energy prices played a big role in these declines, but prices were also more muted for other wholesale goods.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 13, 2026
In the 12 months ending in July, the cost of wholesale goods and services rose 4.7%.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 13, 2026
I bet she’d already figured out who would buy which car and what color, just like she knew who would buy which dress she picked out at the wholesale house in New York City.
From "Cold Sassy Tree" by Olive Ann Burns
Production, exports and wholesales of passenger cars in China all hit fresh highs in November compared with the same month in prior years.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 8, 2025
Industries such as transportation and wholesales showed double-digit falls in special payments, the data showed.
From Reuters ● Jan. 5, 2023
But inflation also has been brutal for many shops, services and other businesses, which are often caught between rising wholesales prices and wages and increasingly cost-conscious customers.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 18, 2022
To some extent, the board split reflected different levels of dependence on the imported supplies that Metropolitan wholesales to the Southland.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 16, 2018
It would be to the interest of rural societies to deal with co-operative wholesales just as much as it is in the interest of urban stores to do so.
From The National Being Some Thoughts on an Irish Polity by George William Russell
That’s not the narrative being wholesaled by the financial press and investment pundits.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 14, 2022
“In a normal situation, there’s some surplus that gets generated when you’re farming,” he said, explaining that the surplus would be wholesaled to other retailers.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 4, 2021
He has brokered real estate deals in Florida, arranged bank loans in Venezuela, marketed industrial pumps in Thailand, wholesaled shoes in Panama, promoted a building-materials company to Mexican interests and advised transnational financial services firms.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 28, 2015
After that, I started a company that wholesaled mobile phones.
From New York Times ● Oct. 15, 2011
Marketing: In our large apple-growing districts the crop is generally wholesaled, either in the orchard or subject to delivery at the railroad, generally in barrels.
From The Apple by Various
On is attempting a more calibrated approach, neither neglecting its shelf space in retail nor wholesaling so many shoes that prices are undermined.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026
Equipment wholesaling and transportation logistics are service industries that saw big jumps in the April data, a sign that higher oil prices are transitioning into a “second-order effect,” Helfstein says.
From Barron's ● May 13, 2026
After the public sector, the wholesaling, retailing, hotels and restaurants sector showed the strongest regular annual growth rate.
From BBC ● Oct. 14, 2025
By the 1930s, the Mayers had expanded into jewelry wholesaling and made more than 100 street clocks for customers in multiple states, said Mendez.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 2, 2024
There is to be no wholesaling except by retailing.
From Quiet Talks with World Winners by S. D. (Samuel Dickey) Gordon
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.
