Retail trade

NACE 4754

Current registrations1,513

Starters, 12 months · division 4710,792

Employment (FTE) · division 47243,144

Median age · division 479.4 years

In NACE division 47, 9.2 companies per 100 started in the past twelve months, against 7.5 nationally; that is higher than that of 66% of the 87 NACE divisions. Comparison: as of 28-09-2026 05:30.

Key figures for NACE division 47

fiscal year 2025 · median over 33,360 filed annual accounts

Median solvency

35.5%

lower than 80% of 79 divisions

Median equity

€93,426

lower than 61% of 79 divisions

Median net result

€10,565

lower than 67% of 79 divisions

Annual accounts in sample

33,360

Foreign control in NACE division 47

61,076 registered companies

Companies with a foreign parent

0.3%

174 of 61,076; Belgium 0.3%

Staff at those companies

14%

30,788 of 217,668 FTE; Belgium 15%

Mostly from Netherlands (52), France (51) and Germany (15).Show on the map by municipality

Bankruptcies

past five years

Bankruptcies (5y)

Historical share

1.72%

Nationally, 1.41% of current registrations have a published bankruptcy opening in the past five years. This sector's historical share is higher than that of 67% of the 88 NACE divisions. The median bankruptcy probability in NACE division 47 is 0.8%, against 0.5% nationally, over 57,456 scored companies. Comparison: as of 28-09-2026 05:30.

Bankruptcies still running

NACE division 47

Running bankruptcies

2,138

Half have run longer than

18 months

Belgium: 19 months

Longer than three years

25%

Belgium: 27%

Measured nationally: Of 47,224 bankruptcies of legal entities across Belgium, 45% were closed within five years for insufficient assets and 29% after liquidation, 4% were withdrawn; 22% were still open after five years. Half had ended after 28 months (a quarter after 16, three quarters after 55 months).

Counts companies with this main activity in the register on 28 September 2026. The outcome itself is not measured by sector: the activity of a company that leaves the register after its bankruptcy is too often not kept to compare closed cases fairly.

Outcome by court and division

Regional split

by region · 980 of 1,513 enterprises with a registered office on file

Flanders 621 · 63.4%

Wallonia 246 · 25.1%

Brussels 110 · 11.2%

Unknown 3 · 0.3%

Recent bankruptcies in this sector

Date	Company
21-09-2026	CHEMINEES DANNEELS BE 0437.694.979
20-08-2026	Sole trader BE 0877.689.157 · Ieper
31-07-2026	VanDaels BE 0771.919.763
03-06-2026	BROTHERS & KM BE 1004.426.288
18-05-2026	Labrints BE 0711.970.496
30-12-2025	MEUBLES SALMAN BE 0761.693.884
24-11-2025	LEXICAL BE 0726.970.755
07-11-2025	ELECTRO - BONCELLES BE 0437.476.829

Geographic distribution

by province · based on the establishment address

West Flanders WVL 130

East Flanders OVL 142

Antwerp ANT 156

Flemish Brabant VLB 102

Limburg LIM 91

Brussels BRU 110

Hainaut HAI 75

Walloon Brabant WBR 44

Namur NAM 36

Liège LIE 78

Luxembourg LUX 13

fewer moremax 156

Where does this sector's wealth sit? By municipality, down to the street

Public money in this sector

per register · legal entities with an enterprise number

Flemish subsidies €417.2m awarded 9,108 recipients · 2022 to 2025 · largest: Erkenning en subsidiëring als maatwerkafdeling
Federal transfers 49.7m amount as published 32 recipients · 2023 to 2025 · largest: Toelagen OCMW's recht op maatschappelijke integratie
Wallonia-Brussels Federation €37.6m paid 113 recipients · 2021 to 2025 · largest: Subventions aux organisations de jeunesse (décret du 20 juin 1980 et du 26 mars 2009)
EU budget €76.7m attributed share 25 recipients · 2021 to 2025 · largest: Information and communication technology
EU research €8.5m eu contribution 13 recipients · 2008 to 2026 · largest: Horizon 2020

Explore every recipient in this sector

How these figures are counted

Current enterprise registrations are counted through their registered main activities; establishment units are excluded. Counted in the KBO's NACE 2025 nomenclature, the one in which code 4754 exists.

Share of currently registered companies with a published bankruptcy opening in the past five years. Registered main activities in the selected classification can overlap. This retrospective share is not a future bankruptcy probability.

The comparison with the country and with the other NACE divisions comes from a nightly overview of every division, each counted in the nomenclature in which it exists. A standing such as "higher than 80%" counts the other divisions that have the figure. The bankruptcy probability is the median of our nightly score over the division's companies that have one; the count is stated.

The key figures cover the whole NACE division 47, not NACE 4754 on its own: there are too few filed annual accounts per five-digit code to compute them separately. The middle company of the sector, based on all filed annual accounts.