GROCER, literally one who sells by the gross, a wholesale dealer ; in modern usage, one who deals in general supplies for the table and for domestic use. The name, as a general one for dealers by wholesale—"engrossers" as opposed to "regrators," the retail dealers—is found with the commodity attached ; thus in the Munimenta Gildhallae ("Rolls" series) ii. 1,304 (quoted in the New English Dictionary) is found an allusion to grossours de vin, cf. groser of fysshe, Surtees Misc. (1888) 63, for the customs of Malton (quoted ib.). The specific application of the word to one who deals either by wholesale or retail in tea, coffee, cocoa, dried fruits, spices, sugar, and all kinds of articles of use or consumption in a household is connected with the history of the Grocers' Company of London, one of the 12 "great" livery com panies. In 1345 the pepperers and the spicers amalgamated and were known as the Fraternity of St. Anthony. The name "gro cers," however, first appears during 1373 in the records of the company.
See J. Aubrey Rees, The Grocery Trade (1910).