Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

businessfinancing.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 163 posts

Re: The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

#101

Post by MisterBastahrd »

blakesterz wrote: post #8
Steltek wrote: post #5

It's amusing to consider the common wisdom that restaurants are a tough, low margin business yet make up so many of the eldest companies. Even if you exceed some threshold to make it to maturity, you'd think the statistics on survival would catch up with you eventually.

It seems like restaurants/bars make it to a certain age where they become part of the fabric of a city/town. They turn into those places where "you just gotta go once or twice a year" and anytime someone comes in from out of town you take them or tell them to go. If I had to guess it's around 25 years. If my parents took me there when I was a kid, the restaurant makes it on that list. If my grandparents took my paren…

There's another reason for this, too: most of the restaurants that are long-lived are on land that is owned by the restaurant and has been for some time. It is incredibly expensive to operate a restaurant AND pay rent to someone, especially city prices. It's not as bad when you're just paying maintenance costs and property taxes.

Re: The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

#102

Post by wyattpeak »

The article claims that the oldest company in Kosovo was founded in 1999. I assume this is related to when it gained statehood, because it seems patently implausible that there are no institutions more than twenty years old.

The trouble is, all sorts of entries on this list predate the formation of the modern states in which they reside. Serbia's Apatin Brewery (1756) clearly predates its time as a part of Yugoslavia. What's the requirement for inclusion here?

Re: The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

#104

Post by dghughes »

NibsNiven wrote: post #76

Canada: Hudson's Bay Company, 1670 England: The Royal Mint, 886 Scotland: Bank of Scotland, 1695 Ireland: Sean's Bar, 900

I was hoping my ancestors went to Sean's bar but it's in Athlone Co. Westmeath, Leinster. My mom's ancestors were from Co. Monaghan and dad's one of the counties somewhere in Ulster province.

Re: The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

#105

Post by Mountain_Skies »

crooked-v wrote: post #73
manfredo wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the above commenter wrote that all of precolonial Africa had a single culture, only that precolonial cultures evidently did not have cultures with long standing businesses - at least as we understand businesses them today.

That's still attributing a single negative cultural trait to an entire continent, and using it to shallowly dismiss the effects of centuries of one-sided exploitation, enslavement, massacres, genocides, mass limb removal, debt slavery, literal slavery, etc etc. with "but what if it was their own fault?".

Is not having long lasting business entities really a negative cultural trait? While it's neat that there are businesses that have survived for over a millennia, it's more of a curiosity than evidence of superiority of a culture.

Re: The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

#106

Post by Mountain_Skies »

wyattpeak wrote: post #102

The article claims that the oldest company in Kosovo was founded in 1999. I assume this is related to when it gained statehood, because it seems patently implausible that there are no institutions more than twenty years old. The trouble is, all sorts of entries on this list predate the formation of the modern states in which they reside. Serbia's Apatin Brewery (1756) clearly predates its time as a part of Yugoslavia…

Probably whatever result comes back from a Google search for "Oldest company in _____".

Re: The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

#107

Post by chrysoprace »

thomasfoster96 wrote: post #65

This map seems to use a very variable and at times generous definition of both “company” and “still in business”. Sure, Australia Post is one of Australia’s oldest institutions if you count from the date of the establishment of its oldest predecessor (which this map does, as a Postmaster-General was first appointed for New South Wales in 1809), but a single national postal service wasn’t established until Australia i…

It's similar to how Carlton claim to have been around since 1832 (when in fact they were founded in 1903[1]). The fact is that their subsidiary Cascade has been around since 1832 but were bought out by Carlton much later[2], therefore making the claim that Carlton is the "oldest brewery in Australia".

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlton_%26_United_Breweries

[2]I can't find a reference to which year they were bought out, but the Wikipedia article above does mention they got bought and they mentioned the year when I took a tour of the Hobart brewery.

Re: The oldest company in almost every country (that is still in business)

#109

Post by Brendinooo »

ineedasername wrote: post #63
krapp wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Vatican is a nation.

It is, nominally, a nation in name, done for political reasons to remedy the Italian government's exertion of power over the institution. Idiosyncrasies of naming aside, it serves much the same purpose as a corporate headquarters. And regardless of all of that, it's nationhood is new, under 100 years old. Imagine we suddenly granted Apple headquarters nationhood: it would not change the material reality that it is fu…

The Papal States were a thing for about 1000 years though.
Post reply on HN