Episode – 2311 : The World's Oldest Companies
This episode can be found at: https://everything-everywhere.com/the-worlds-oldest-companies/
Podcast Transcript
Most businesses fail within a few years. Even the most successful companies rarely survive more than a century.
Wars, economic crises, technological revolutions, and changing consumer tastes have destroyed countless businesses throughout history.
Yet a remarkable handful have survived for centuries. Some operated before the Vikings, the Crusades, or even the founding of the Holy Roman Empire.
Learn more about the world’s oldest companies and the secrets behind their extraordinary longevity on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
Companies are not eternal. Even very large companies have a shorter lifespan than most people realize. I previously did an episode on the companies that made up the original Dow Jones Industrial Average in 1896.
Today, none of them exist. The one that lasted the longest, General Electric, split into three companies in 2024; one kept the name, but it isn’t the same company.
Economic downturns, bad investments, poor corporate strategy, and failing to keep up with market trends can kill even the largest businesses.
Smaller businesses have their own struggles. Keeping a business in the family can be challenging if the owners’ children don’t want to be in the business. They, too, face any number of things that only need to happen once to kill a business.
Yet, despite all odds, there are some companies, a very small number, that have survived the test of time. They have existed for centuries, and in a few cases, over a millennium.
In May 2008, the Bank of Korea published a report titled Factors Behind the Longevity of Japanese Companies and Their Implications.
What they found was fascinating. At the time of the study, they identified 5,586 companies that were at least 200 years old across 41 countries. Of those, 56.3% were located in one country: Japan.
Another 15% were in Germany, 4% in the Netherlands, 3.5% in France, and the rest scattered around the world.
These companies tended to be small, with 90% having fewer than 300 employees. They also shared many other attributes.
First, they focused on the core business. Companies concentrated on what they did well rather than diversifying into unrelated industries.
Second, they developed trust and reputation. Maintaining relationships with customers, employees, and suppliers was more important than maximizing immediate profits.
Third was a commitment to Craftsmanship. Companies preserved specialized skills and improved them over generations.
Fourth was flexible succession. Family businesses sometimes selected successors outside the bloodline when necessary, rather than insisting on inheritance by a biological descendant.
Finally, they practiced conservative financial management. Businesses avoided excessive borrowing, rapid expansion, and unnecessary risk.
With that, I want to go over some of the oldest companies in the world. All of these companies are many centuries old, but this isn’t just a list ranked by age. Each of these companies does something different, and you might even have heard of some of them before.
We’ll start with the oldest company on Earth, founded during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian II in 578. The Japanese construction firm Kong? Gumi.
It was founded by a Korean carpenter in Japan to help build Shitenn?-ji, a Buddhist temple in Osaka.
For more than 1,400 years, Kong? Gumi specialized in constructing, restoring, and maintaining Buddhist temples and other traditional wooden buildings. The company passed through approximately 40 generations of the Kong? family, preserving traditional Japanese carpentry techniques.
Despite surviving wars, natural disasters, and major political changes, Kong? Gumi encountered financial difficulties after accumulating substantial debt during Japan’s economic bubble. In 2006, Takamatsu Construction Group acquired the company, ending its independence after 1,428 years. However, Kong? Gumi continues to operate as a subsidiary, preserving its historic name and traditional construction expertise.
The world’s second oldest company was founded in 705 in Japa, before the birth of Charlemagne: Nishiyama Onsen Keiunkan.
It is a traditional Japanese hot spring hotel, or ryokan, founded in 705, making it the world’s oldest continuously operating hotel according to Guinness World Records. Located in the mountains of Yamanashi Prefecture near Mount Fuji, it has welcomed guests for more than 1,300 years.
The hotel is famous for its natural hot springs, which draw mineral-rich water from underground geothermal sources. Throughout its history, it has hosted samurai, military commanders, and other prominent figures, including the famous warlord Takeda Shingen.
The hotel remained under the same family’s management for 52 generations, until ownership changed in 2017. Although the building has been renovated and modernized, the hotel still uses the same hot spring source that attracted its earliest visitors.
Established in the year 803, St. Peter Stiftskulinarium in Salzburg, Austria, is the world’s oldest restaurant. I previously did an entire episode on Sobrino de Botín in Madrid, the oldest continually operating restaurant. St. Peter Stiftskulinarium is older but has had interruptions in service.
The restaurant is located within the St. Peter’s Abbey complex. We can trace its origins to 803, when it was mentioned in the writings of the scholar Alcuin of York during the reign of Charlemagne.
Originally linked to the monastery’s wine cellar and hospitality, it evolved over the centuries into an elegant restaurant serving Austrian- and Mediterranean-inspired cuisine.
Founded in 1040, before the Norman Conquest, is the oldest continuously operating brewery in the world: the Weihenstephan Brewery. Officially known as the Bavarian State Brewery Weihenstephan, is located in Freising, Germany, near Munich.
The brewery traces its origins to a Benedictine monastery established on Weihenstephan Hill in the eighth century. According to its traditional history, the monastery received brewing rights in 1040, allowing the monks to produce and sell beer. Brewing continued through centuries of fires, wars, and political upheaval.
In 1803, the monastery was dissolved during Bavaria’s secularization, and the Bavarian government took over the brewery. Rather than closing, it continued operating as a state-owned enterprise. In 1921, it officially adopted the name Bavarian State Brewery Weihenstephan.
Today, the brewery remains owned by the Bavarian state and is closely associated with the Technical University of Munich’s brewing science programs. It produces several traditional German beer styles, particularly wheat beers.
Also established in the year 1040 is Italy’s oldest company, Pontificia Fonderia Marinelli.
The company is a historic bell foundry in Agnone, Italy, traditionally dated to 1040. Although its exact founding date is uncertain, the earliest surviving documented bell made by the Marinelli family dates to 1339.
For centuries, the Marinelli family has specialized in casting bronze church bells using traditional techniques passed down through generations. In 1924, Pope Pius XI granted the foundry permission to use the papal coat of arms, giving it the designation Pontificia.
The foundry survived wars, economic hardships, and a devastating fire in 1950. Today, it continues producing bells for churches around the world, largely using medieval casting methods. It also operates a museum dedicated to the history and craftsmanship of bellmaking.
Munke Mølle, meaning “Monks’ Mill,” is a Danish company founded in 1135 in Odense, Denmark. Benedictine monks associated with St. Canute’s Monastery built it as a water-powered grain mill. The mill received royal privileges in 1175, helping establish its importance in the local economy.
Following the Protestant Reformation in 1536, the mill passed into royal ownership and later into private hands. It continued producing flour for centuries, gradually adopting modern milling technology. During the nineteenth century, steam power supplemented traditional water-powered milling, and in 1905, the company moved to a modern facility at Odense Harbor.
In 1881, businessman J. P. Petersen purchased the mill and transformed it into one of Denmark’s most modern flour producers. The company later introduced branded flour products and became a major commercial milling operation.
Today, a Swedish cooperative owns the company.
Founded in 1526, the Beretta corporation, officially known as Fabbrica d’Armi Pietro Beretta, is an Italian firearms manufacturer in Gardone Val Trompia, near Brescia, Italy.
It is the world’s oldest continuously operating firearms manufacturer and one of the oldest family-owned companies. The earliest documented record dates to October 3, 1526, when master gunsmith Bartolomeo Beretta sold 185 arquebus barrels to the Republic of Venice.
During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Beretta expanded from barrel-making to producing complete firearms, including pistols, rifles, and shotguns. It became a major international supplier of weapons for military, law enforcement, and civilian use.
Today, the founding family still controls Beretta after 15 generations.
Kikkoman is a Japanese food company best known for producing soy sauce. Its origins date to 1603, when families in the town of Noda, near present-day Tokyo, began brewing soy sauce using traditional fermentation techniques.
During the Edo period, Noda became an important center of soy sauce production, supplying the growing population of Edo, now Tokyo. The Kikkoman brand emerged from several family-run breweries that developed reputations for producing high-quality soy sauce.
In 1917, eight family-owned brewing businesses merged to form Noda Shoyu Co., Ltd., the predecessor of the modern Kikkoman Corporation.
If you have ever been to a restaurant that had a distinctive soy sauce bottle on the table, odds are it was probably Kikkoman.
I’ll conclude with Zildjian, an American musical instrument manufacturer best known for producing cymbals used by drummers and percussionists around the world. Avedis Zildjian, an Armenian metalsmith, founded the company in 1623 in Constantinople and developed a special bronze alloy for making musical cymbals.
According to company tradition, Avedis initially experimented with metal alloys while attempting to produce gold. His discovery resulted in a durable, resonant bronze alloy that proved ideal for cymbals. Sultan Osman II granted him the surname Zildjian, meaning “son of the cymbal maker,” and the family established a business supplying cymbals to Ottoman musicians.
The Zildjian family kept the company for generations, supplying cymbals to military bands, orchestras, and eventually modern musicians. In 1929, Avedis Zildjian III moved the family business to Quincy, Massachusetts, where it benefited from jazz’s growing popularity. Working with influential drummers such as Gene Krupa, Zildjian developed new cymbal designs suited to modern drum kits.
During the 1960s, rock music, particularly the Beatles, dramatically increased demand for Zildjian cymbals. The company moved its manufacturing operations to Norwell, Massachusetts, in 1973.
Today, Zildjian remains family-owned after more than 400 years, even after moving countries. Musicians worldwide use its products, and it has expanded into drumsticks, mallets, and electronic percussion equipment.
The world’s oldest companies are remarkable not simply because they have survived so long, but because the world has changed so much around them.
They have endured wars, plagues, economic collapses, political revolutions, and technological transformations that rendered countless other businesses obsolete. While some have changed ownership or adapted their products over the centuries, many still perform essentially the same work they did when they were founded.
Their histories demonstrate that longevity in business doesn’t necessarily require constant innovation or rapid growth. Sometimes, it comes from doing one thing exceptionally well, preserving knowledge across generations, and adapting just enough to survive.
Automatically extracted from this episode; not independently verified. Please report possible errors below.
People mentioned in episode #2311
- Justinian II
- Takamatsu Construction Group
- Charlemagne
- Takeda Shingen
- Alcuin of York
- Bartolomeo Beretta
- Pope Pius XI
- Avedis Zildjian
- Osman II
Places mentioned in episode #2311
- Osaka
- Yamanashi Prefecture
- Salzburg
- Freising
- Agnone
- Odense
- Brescia
- Noda
- Constantinople
- Tokyo
Historical events in episode #2311
- 578 — Foundation of Kong? Gumi (impact 40/100)
- 705 — Foundation of Nishiyama Onsen Keiunkan (impact 60/100)
- 803 — Foundation of St. Peter Stiftskulinarium (impact 20/100)
- 1040 — Foundation of Weihenstephan Brewery (impact 30/100)
- 1040 — Foundation of Pontificia Fonderia Marinelli (impact 40/100)
- 1526 — Foundation of Beretta (impact 30/100)
- 1623 — Foundation of Zildjian (impact 40/100)
- 2017 — Ownership change of Nishiyama Onsen Keiunkan (impact 20/100)
Episode topics
- Colonialism
- Culture
- Economics
- History