Federal obligations in electrical apparatus and wiring supplies merchant wholesalers (NAICS 423610)

Wholesale electrical supply: $1.02 billion on 70,507 actions

Merchant wholesalers in 423610 distribute electrical apparatus, wiring supplies, and related equipment. Federal facilities buy through those distributors on a high volume of small and mid-size orders. The tagged obligation total is $1,017,427,458.69. That is not manufacturing value added and not construction put in place; it is wholesale-coded contract commitments.

Seventy thousand five hundred seven awards is among the highest counts in this slice, in the same family of behavior as fastener manufacturing though the industry sector is trade rather than fabrication. $1,017,427,458.69 divided by 70,507 is about $14,430 per action. That average fits catalog and delivery-order buying. It is not a typical construction-contract size.

Wholesaler versus manufacturer versus electrician

A manufacturer of transformers or switchgear uses a manufacturing NAICS (several appear later in this slice). An electrical contractor installing wire uses a construction code. 423610 is the merchant wholesaler in the middle of that chain. Dual-role firms can be tagged either way depending on the contracting officer’s view of the principal industry. The $1,017,427,458.69 follows the 423610 tag on 70,507 actions as recorded.

Readers summing “all electrical spending” across manufacturing, wholesale, and construction will mix different stages of the same physical goods. This guide does not perform that sum. It states the wholesale slice only.

Why award count explodes in wholesale codes

Maintenance shops place frequent restock orders. Each call against a supply schedule can be a USAspending action. 70,507 is therefore not 70,507 unique distributors and not 70,507 unique part numbers. It is the tagged action count. Filter the industry hub if you need large-dollar rows rather than the long tail.

Assistance awards may not carry NAICS. A school-construction grant that buys panelboards through a wholesaler using grant funds will usually miss this contract rollup.

A complete citation of this industry is $1,017,427,458.69 in USAspending contract obligations tagged to NAICS 423610, electrical apparatus and wiring supplies merchant wholesalers, on 70,507 awards. Anything less—dropping the NAICS, dropping the word obligations, or dropping the contract-only universe—overstates what the extract contains. The packet facts do not include a fiscal year, so this guide does not invent one. Live tables on the industry hub can move when USAspending posts modifications; the harvested pair remains $1,017,427,458.69 and 70,507.

Obligations on supply schedules

Schedule orders obligate when the call is placed, then pay on delivery. The $1,017,427,458.69 is the commitment total on 70,507 tagged actions, not cash already paid for every spool of wire. Returns and cancellations de-obligate. Keep outlays on a separate export.

Classification errors are expected at the margin. Vendors that straddle transformer manufacturing, HVAC manufacturing, and electrical contractors may land in 423610 on some actions and in a neighbor on others. Power transformer manufacturing (335311) is an OEM code, not a wholesaler code. The public-record stance is to keep $1,017,427,458.69 attached to 423610 as tagged, then aggregate first; 70,507 rows are a distribution catalog. Re-tagging the extract by hand is out of scope for this overlay.

Hub at catalog scale

Do not read 70,507 rows as a story. Use aggregates on the electrical wholesalers industry page, then sample. This overlay states source (USAspending.gov), unit (obligations), dollars ($1,017,427,458.69), and count (70,507). The all-industries directory links manufacturing neighbors such as transformer manufacturing without merging their totals into this wholesale figure.

Wholesale electrical NAICS is a trade code, not an OEM code

Award count interprets the buying pattern. 70,507 actions producing $1,017,427,458.69 is tens of thousands of wholesale catalog and schedule calls, with about $14,430 per action as the simple average. That average hides mix: modifications, options, and delivery orders all increment count. 70,507 is not a count of unique companies and not a count of physical units. Use the hub amount sort to see whether a few large rows plus a long tail make up most of the tagged total.

Outlays remain a separate USAspending concept. An agency can obligate $1,017,427,458.69 across 70,507 tagged electrical apparatus and wiring supplies merchant wholesalers actions and pay on a different calendar. De-obligations after cancellations reduce the obligation ledger; they do not rewrite the fact that this NAICS has been a large tagged category in the harvest. Assistance without NAICS still sits outside even when the real-world activity looks similar. Program pages answer the grant question; this page answers the tagged-contract question.

Internal links on this file point only to the electrical apparatus and wiring supplies merchant wholesalers industry page and the all-industries directory. Those are the packet hrefs. Neighboring industry codes mentioned in prose are classification context only. Source note, copied from the packet: NAICS from USAspending contract awards. Assistance awards may not carry NAICS. The overlay’s job is to state $1,017,427,458.69, 70,507, the obligation unit, and the boundary around transformer manufacturing, HVAC manufacturing, and electrical contractors.

Questions

How much federal contract spending is coded to electrical wholesalers?

NAICS 423610 shows $1,017,427,458.69 in obligations on 70,507 USAspending contract awards. That is merchant wholesale of electrical apparatus and wiring supplies, not manufacturing or electrical contracting. The unit is obligations, not outlays. Quote it as USAspending contract obligations tagged to NAICS 423610, not as cash outlays. Assistance awards may not carry NAICS, so grants remain outside the 70,507-award extract behind $1,017,427,458.69.

Why are there more than 70,000 awards?

Electrical supplies are bought as many catalog and schedule calls. 70,507 actions against $1,017,427,458.69 averages about $14,430. Restocks and delivery orders add rows. The industry hub shows the size mix. Power transformer manufacturing (335311) is an OEM code, not a wholesaler code. Keep $1,017,427,458.69 attached to 423610 as tagged on 70,507 actions; do not merge neighbor codes into the same unlabeled cell.

Does 423610 include transformer manufacturers?

Not by design. Manufacturing uses other NAICS. This page’s $1,017,427,458.69 follows the merchant-wholesaler tag. Dual-role vendors may be coded either way; award descriptions on the hub are the check. That pattern is tens of thousands of wholesale catalog and schedule calls, with about $14,430 per action as the simple average of $1,017,427,458.69 over 70,507 awards. Aggregate first; 70,507 rows are a distribution catalog.

Are construction grants for wiring included?

Usually not. Assistance awards may not carry NAICS, so they fall outside this 70,507-award contract extract. Use program pages for grants. This industry guide covers tagged contracts only: $1,017,427,458.69 obligated on 70,507 electrical apparatus and wiring supplies merchant wholesalers awards in USAspending. Outlays are a different field; assistance without NAICS is a different award type.