noun
- a retail dealer in men’s furnishings, as shirts, ties, gloves, socks, and hats.
- Chiefly British. a dealer in small wares and notions.
noun
- British a dealer in small articles for sewing, such as buttons, zips, and ribbons
- US a men’s outfitter
early 14c., “seller of various small articles of trade” (late 13c. as a surname), agent noun from Anglo-French hapertas “small wares,” also a kind of fabric, of unknown origin. Sense of “dealer in men’s wares” is 1887 in American English, via intermediate sense of “seller of caps.”