NAICS 238210 · California overview

Electrical Contractors in Butte County

Butte County had 61 Electrical establishments in 2023, ranking 28 of 54 California counties and accounting for 0.6% of the statewide total.

Establishments (2023)
61
Rank 28 of 54 counties
Employees
546
Mid-March employment
Annual payroll
$37M
All establishments
Per 10k residents
2.9
209,211 residents

More recent reading

BLS QCEW, 2026Q1

The figures above are County Business Patterns, which carries the size distribution but runs about two years behind. The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes quarterly, so this is the same industry roughly 3 years later. The two count different universes, Census counts establishments with paid employees in the March pay period and BLS counts worksites covered by unemployment insurance during the quarter, so the numbers are not directly comparable and either can be the larger.

Establishments
68
2026Q1
Employment
404
Quarter-end level
Average weekly wage
$1,385
Per covered worker
Quarterly trend
-1.4%
2025Q2 to 2026Q1
Concentration vs the national averageBLS, 2026Q1

0.90 location quotient. Electrical is about as concentrated in Butte County as it is nationally.

Computed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, not derived here. Above 1.0 means the industry is a larger share of local employment than of national employment.

Establishments by size

Employee-count distribution for Electrical in Butte County. 14 of 61 establishments (23%) employ 10 or more people, the practical floor for most acquisition financing.

EmployeesEstablishmentsShareDistribution
1-43354.1%
5-91219.7%
10-191016.4%
20-4946.6%

Establishment trend

Year-over-year establishment counts, County Business Patterns. Net growth of 5.2% since 2020.

YearEstablishmentsChange
202058n/a
202159+1
2022590
202361+2

How this market compares

Butte County against every other county in California on the same measure. The median excludes places under 2,000 residents, where per-capita figures are arithmetically true but analytically useless.

Typical2.9 per 10,000 residents, against a state median of 2.7

Close to the state median for this industry. Provision is roughly what the population would predict.

Vs state median
+8%
Businesses per resident
Rank by count
#28
of 54 counties
Rank by density
#22
of 54 ranked
Since 2020
+5%
Change in establishments

Density compares electrical contractors provision per resident. It does not measure revenue, profitability or whether a market is worth entering.

Business size mix

Butte is more consolidated than California as a whole: fewer micro-operators and a larger share of businesses with real headcount. Fewer targets, but the ones that exist are more likely to be financeable.

Share of establishmentsButteCaliforniaDifference
Under 5 employeesOwner-operated, often no management layer54.1%62.2%-8.1%
5 to 49 employeesThe range most individual buyers target42.6%33.3%+9.4%
10 or more employeesPractical floor for acquisition financing23.0%19.7%+3.3%

What acquirers look at

Licensing requirements limit new entrants. Service and small-commercial work is far more acquirable than new-construction shops, which carry heavy working-capital and bonding needs.

Cities in Butte

The figures above cover the county as a whole. These are the places within it.

Other industries in Butte

Sources

  1. U.S. Census Bureau, 2023 County Business Patterns. Establishment counts, employment and annual payroll by NAICS. Retrieved 2026-09-08.
  2. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (2026Q1). Quarterly establishment counts and employment for employers covered by unemployment insurance. Retrieved 2026-09-08.