Quarterly retail e-commerce sales are estimated from the same sample used for the Monthly Retail Trade Survey (MRTS) to estimate preliminary and final U.S. retail sales. Coverage includes all retailers whether or not they are engaged in e-commerce. Online travel services, financial brokers and dealers, and ticket sales agencies are not classified as retail and are not included in either the total retail or retail e-commerce sales estimates.

Provides an early indication of sales of retail and food service companies throughout the United States.

To provide broad and timely measures of combined changes in business sales and end-of-month inventories for domestic retail trade, wholesale trade and manufacturers' activities.

Provides current estimates of sales at retail and food services stores and inventories held by retail stores throughout the United States.

The Annual Retail Trade Survey (ARTS) produces national estimates of total annual sales, e-commerce sales, end-of-year inventories, inventory-to-sales ratios, purchases, total operating expenses, inventories held outside the United States, gross margins, and end-of-year accounts receivable for retail businesses and annual sales and e-commerce sales for accommodation and food service firms located in the U.S.

The e-commerce measures report the value of goods and services sold online whether over open networks such as the Internet, or over proprietary networks running systems such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI). E-commerce data were collected in four separate Census Bureau surveys. These surveys used different measures of economic activity such as shipments for manufacturing, sales for wholesale and retail trade, and revenues for service industries. Consequently, measures of total economic and e-commerce activity vary by economic sector, are conceptually and definitionally different, and therefore, are not additive.

The Business Expenses Supplement (BES) compiles statistics on business operating expenses during the Economic Census year. Detailed operating expenses are collected for Wholesale Distributors, Retail Trade, Accomodation and Food Services, Manufacturing, Construction, and Mining. Business expenses data are used routinely by government program officials, particularly the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis which uses the data for the Nation's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) estimates and in developing the National Accounts input-output tables. Other users of business expenses data include market researchers, economic analysts, academics and business owners.