The Shrewsbury Drapers Company was a trade organisation founded in 1462 in the town of Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England. The members were wholesale dealers in wool or woollen cloth.The Company dominated the trade in Welsh cloth for many years, holding a virtual monopoly from the 16th century to the late 18th century. It lost its position when the roads were improved, making it practical for factors from Liverpool and elsewhere to travel into Wales and purchase cloth directly from the makers, and became irrelevant when the Industrial Revolution made trade guilds obsolete. Today it survives as a charity that runs almshouses in Shrewsbury.