Jobbers

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A class of workers or contractors taking on specific tasks at varying intervals
2. Individuals or companies who purchase goods from manufacturers and sell them to retailers ; workers who carry out particular duties for businesses on a temporary or as-needed basis
3. Persons acting as middlemen distributing products between producers and stores ; laborers engaged in completing assigned jobs intermittently

Etymology: Jobbers were once the people who bought goods in bulk from merchants and resold them in smaller lots, and the word began as a plain formation: "job" plus the agent suffix "-er". The suffix itself has a long pedigree. It descends from Latin "-arius", which passed into Old French as "-ier" and entered English as "-er", with the Old English "-ere" as an earlier form of the same ending. The noun "job" is the older puzzle. Its origin is obscure, and the word has no certain ancestor in older English, so the "job" half is best understood simply as the English noun it is. Put together, "jobber" describes someone who does piecework or trades in odd lots, a meaning that stayed close to the word's roots as the trade itself grew.

Synonyms: dealers, traders, brokers, middlemen, merchants

Antonyms: manufacturers, producers, creators, originators, designers