wholesale
adjEtymology From whole + sale.
1
Of or relating to sale in large quantities, for resale.
2
Figuratively Extensive, indiscriminate, all-encompassing; blanket.
- The bombing resulted in wholesale destruction.
- But beyond these cut-offs, to avoid the wholesale alteration of all mileposting and mileages—of bridges and culverts, for example—the original mileposts have remained unaltered.1946 July and August, “Mileposts and their Peculiarities”, in Railway Magazine, page 217:
2 more examples
- By wholesale omission of connections and by the use of a microscopic scale of photographic reproduction which makes some of the most important tables difficult to read, the size has been cut down from last winter's 580 to 520 pages only.1961 October, “The winter timetables of British Railways: London Midland Region”, in Trains Illustrated, page 593:
- With financial losses emerging in 1957, the BTC abandoned the diesel pilot scheme in favour of wholesale orders for untried designs.2023 March 8, David Clough, “The long road that led to Beeching”, in RAIL, number 978, page 43: