shop—noun

1. a retail store, especially a small one.
2. a small store or department in a large store selling a specific or select type of goods: the ski shop at Smith’s.
3. the workshop of a craftsperson or artisan.
4. the workshop of a person who works in a manual trade; place for doing specific, skilled manual work: a carpenter’s shop.
5. any factory, office, or business: Our ad agency is a well-run shop.
6. Education.
   1. a course of instruction in a trade, as carpentry, printing, etc., consisting chiefly of training in the use of its tools and materials.
   2. a classroom in which such a course is given.
7. one’s trade, profession, or business as a subject of conversation or preoccupation.

 

—verb (used without object), shopped, shop·ping.

8. to visit shops and stores for purchasing or examining goods.
9. to seek or examine goods, property, etc., offered for sale: Retail merchants often stock their stores by shopping in New York.
10. to seek a bargain, investment, service, etc. (usually followed by for): I’m shopping for a safe investment that pays good interest.

 

—verb (used with object), shopped, shop·ping.

11. to seek or examine goods, property, etc., offered for sale in or by: She’s shopping the shoe stores this afternoon.
12. Chiefly British Informal.
    1. to put into prison; jail.
    2. to behave treacherously toward; inform on; betray.
13. Slang.to try to sell (merchandise or a project) in an attempt to obtain an order or contract.

 

—interjection

14. (used in a store, shop, etc., in calling an employee to wait on a customer.)

 

—Idioms

15. set up shop,to go into business; begin business operations: to set up shop as a taxidermist.
16. shut up shop,
    1. to close a business temporarily, as at the end of the day.
    2. to suspend business operations permanently: They couldn’t make a go of it and had to shut up shop.
17. talk shop,to discuss one’s trade, profession, or business: After dinner we all sat around the table and talked shop.

 

Origin: 1250–1300; Middle English shoppe (noun), Old English sceoppa booth; akin to scypen stall, shippon, German Schopf lean-to, Schuppen shed

—Related forms
in·ter·shop, adjective