dry goods

textile fabrics and related merchandise, as distinguished from groceries, hardware, etc.

Origin of dry goods

First recorded in 1695–1705

In the business world of New York there was known at that time a pair of brothers; they were in dry-goods.

Stage Confidences |Clara Morris
Horse-cars struggle on it with light carts of dry-goods dealers, with the slow, enormous teams that shake the ground.

From the Easy Chair, series 3 |George William Curtis
Fellow-passenger a Boston dry-goods dealer, travelling to collect bills.

Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 |Nathaniel Hawthorne
A cracked cooking-stove, and a cupboard behind it formed of a dry-goods box, but all the utensils were scrupulously clean.

Witch Winnie |Elizabeth W. Champney

It would be nice to marry a whole store full of dry-goods and have a new dress every time you wanted one.

The Blunders of a Bashful Man |Metta Victoria Fuller Victor