See also: trade store trading post (def. 1) trading room
- 1856  This is the trading-store. It is always recognisable, if natives are in the neighbourhood, by the bevy of red men that cluster round it, awaiting the coming of the store-keeper or the trader. . . .
- 1957  Save for such innovations as the radio and the outboard motor and a grater variety of merchandise in the two trading stores, the people live much the same life as they have done for generations.
2 a store operated by a private merchant who engages in a certain amount of barter, usually in a frontier community.
See also: trading post (def. 2)
- 1880  A small single-storied dwelling made of hewn logs, little better than the rude farm-house of a Canadian backwoodsman, a trading-store as plain as the dwelling, a smoke-house for curing and storing fish and meat, and a stable constitute the whole establishment.
- 1909  The settlement boasts two churches, two mission schools, and two trading stores. . . .