As a major seaport, Bristol has a long history of trading commodities, originally wool cloth exports and imports of fish, wine, grain and dairy produce, later tobacco, tropical fruits and plantation goods; major imports now are motor vehicles, grain, timber, fresh produce and petroleum products. Deals were originally struck on a personal basis in the former trading area around The Exchange in Corn Street, and in particular, over bronze trading tables, known as “The Nails“. This is often given as the origin of the expression “cash on the nail”, meaning immediate payment, however it is likely that the expression was in use before the nails were erected.

As well as Bristol’s nautical connections, the city’s economy is reliant on the aerospace industry, defence, the media, information technology and financial services sectors, and tourism. The former Ministry of Defence (MoD)’s Procurement Executive, later the Defence Procurement Agency, and now Defence Equipment & Support, moved to a purpose-built headquarters at Abbey Wood, Filton in 1995. The site employs some 7,000 to 8,000 staff and is responsible for procuring and supporting much of the MoD’s defence equipment.

In 2004 Bristol’s GDP was £9.439 billion, and the combined GDP of Gloucestershire, Wiltshire and North Somerset was £44.098 billion. The GDP per head was £23,962 (US$47,738, €35,124) making the city more affluent than the UK as a whole, at 40% above the national average. This makes it the third-highest per-capita GDP of any English city, after London and Nottingham, and the fifth highest GDP per capita of any city in the United Kingdom, behind London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Belfast and Nottingham. In March 2007, Bristol’s unemployment rate was 4.8%, compared with 4.0% for the south west and 5.5% for England.

Although Bristol’s economy is no longer reliant upon the Port of Bristol, which was relocated gradually to the mouth of the Avon to new docks at Avonmouth (1870s)^[93] and Royal Portbury Dock (1977) as the size of shipping increased, the city is the largest importer of cars to the UK.^[94] Since the port was leased in 1991, £330 million has been invested and the annual tonnage throughput has increased from 3.9 million long tons (4 million tonnes) to 11.8 million long tons (12 million tonnes).^[95] The tobacco trade and cigarette manufacturing have now ceased, but imports of wines and spirits by Harveys and Averys continue.

The financial services sector employs 59,000 in the city, and the high-tech sector is important, with 50 micro-electronics and silicon design companies, which employ around 5,000 people, including the Hewlett-Packard national research laboratories, which opened in 1983. Bristol is the UK’s seventh most popular destination for foreign tourists, and the city receives nine million visitors each year.

In the 20th century, Bristol’s manufacturing activities expanded to include aircraft production at Filton, by the Bristol Aeroplane Company, and aero-engine manufacture by Bristol Aero Engines (later Rolls-Royce) at Patchway. The aeroplane company became famous for the World War I Bristol Fighter, and Second World War Blenheim and Beaufighter aircraft. In the 1950s it became one of the country’s major manufacturers of civil aircraft, with the Bristol Freighter and Britannia and the huge Brabazon airliner. The Bristol Aeroplane Company diversified into car manufacturing in the 1940s, producing hand-built luxury cars at their factory in Filton, under the name Bristol Cars, which became independent from the Bristol Aeroplane Company in 1960. The city also gave its name to the Bristol make of buses, manufactured in the city from 1908 to 1983, first by the local bus operating company, Bristol Tramways, and from 1955 by Bristol Commercial Vehicles.