In business since 578

In The End of a 1,400-Year-Old Business (BusinessWeek, April 16, 2007), James Olan Hutcheson looks at Japanese temple builder Kongo Gumi, a family business that began operations in 578 and folded in 2006.

(And yes, I know, that's not 1,400 years, precisely. It's a 1,428-year run, something Hutcheson notes in his story. The headline writer apparently rounded the figure down, all right? I guess he or she decided that when you're talking about fourteen centuries, what's a matter of 28 years, more or less?)

hat tip: John Moser