The Data Axle (formerly Infogroup) U.S. Historical Business collection contains establishment-level data for more than 24 million businesses, including the business name, location, industry classification code, number of employees, and sales volume. Each establishment has a unique identifier to make year over year comparisons easier. Records have also been geocoded for use with GIS software. The un-zipped files are very large (they range in size from 3-6 GB), so if you need assistance with downloading or using the files, please contact us at data@virginia.edu.
Note that we also have a subscription to Data Axle Reference Solutions (formerly ReferenceUSA), an online database of current establishment-level business data from Data Axle (formerly Infogroup), with historical records back to 2003. Researchers who need relatively small data extracts, for example, “all coffee shops in Virginia,” should use this database. Data Axle Reference Solutions limits downloads to 1000 records/search for the U.S. Business Database and 250 records/search for the U.S. Historical Businesses Database.
Reference Materials:
- Business Data Compilation (PDF) – 2018 InfoGroup slidedeck reviewing data collection practices.
- How InfoGroup assigns NAICS and SIC codes:
- File layouts, varies by year:
- 2018 Layout (Excel) – contains description of the fields. This will match the layout for 2018.
- 2016 Layout (Excel) – contains detailed description of the fields. This is an older version of the Excel record layout produced in 2016.
- 2014 Layout and Codebook (Excel) – contains detailed description of the fields. This is an older version of the Excel record layout produced in 2014.
- 2014 File Record Layout (PDF) – contains information on the different fields for each data file, such as company name, address, NAICS code, SIC code, employee size, etc. This is the older version of the PDF record layout produced in 2014.
- Further documentation about Data Axle data, services, and APIs.
InfoGroup Historical Business Data:
- 1997 Historical Business Data (3.65GB, 12,654,833 records)
- 1998 Historical Business Data (3.87GB, 10,774,211 records)
- 1999 Historical Business Data (3.96GB, 11,020,066 records)
- 2000 Historical Business Data (4.01GB, 11,169,276 records)
- 2001 Historical Business Data (4.47GB, 12,549,384 records)
- 2002 Historical Business Data (4.56GB, 12,848,949 records)
- 2003 Historical Business Data (4.22GB, 12,798,773 records)
- 2004 Historical Business Data (4.44GB, 12,494,074 records)
- 2005 Historical Business Data (4.75GB, 13,412,766 records)
- 2006 Historical Business Data (4.87GB, 13,803,737 records)
- 2007 Historical Business Data (4.97GB, 14,110,404 records)
- 2008 Historical Business Data (4.94GB, 13,993,594 records)
- 2009 Historical Business Data (4.94GB, 14,026,069 records)
- 2010 Historical Business Data (4.59GB, 13,784,587 records)
- 2011 Historical Business Data (5.83GB, 14,526,333 records)
- 2012 Historical Business Data (5.68GB, 15,230,367 records)
- 2013 Historical Business Data (6.3GB, 16,244,369 records)
- 2014 Historical Business Data (6.04GB, 15,450,496 records)
- 2015 Historical Business Data (5.7GB, 15,628,916 records)
- 2016 Historical Business Data (5.7GB, 15,716,633 records)
- 2017 Historical Business Data (5.5GB, 14,827,152 records)
- 2018 Historical Business Data (5.4GB, 14,699,426 records)
- First 9 observations of the 2018 data (3KB csv file)
- 2019 Historical Business Data
- 2020 Historical Business Data
- 2021 Historical Business Data
- 2022 Historical Business Data
- 2023 Historical Business Data
Access Restrictions: UVA Faculty, Staff, and Students. To be used for scholarly, educational, research purposes and non-commercial use only.
Questions? Contact data@virginia.edu.
Last updated 21 May 2024