In the hit romantic comedy, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”(2002), Fotoula “Toula” Portakolas, an unmarried, 30 year old daughter of Greek immigrants, conspires with her female relatives to trick her traditional father into allowing her to work in her aunt’s travel business. Toula has changed her hair, started wearing makeup and modernized her aunt’s business […]
When a gap in leadership for an iconic French luxury goods brand threatened the welfare of the family owned company, immediate best interests of the company required outside assistance — and an outsider stepped in as CEO. Family businesses can successfully incorporate non-family members in key roles in the company, without sacrificing control. When is […]
How are Australian family businesses doing, cents and (Australian) dollars? After the official Australian governmental report was issued: Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services: Family Businesses in Australia — Different and Significant; Why They Shouldn’t be Overlooked [March 2013], The accounting firm of KPMG/Australia partnered with Family Business of Australia [FBA] to conduct […]
American businesses, especially family businesses, are a patchwork of sizes, types, business models, and cultures. Working out of living rooms as well as boardrooms, corner cafes and highrises, from smartphones, offices, laptops and garages, there is no “model” family business owner in the United States. Australia, however, wants to change the game for Australian businesses […]
McDonalds, circa 1749? Walmart, est. 1665? Not really, but not so unusual in Europe. While American family-owned and operated businesses tend to be entrepreneurial, according to The Economist, European family businesses tend to be older, multi-generational and extensive — parents, brothers, sisters and cousins, looking to operate the business as an extended family-sustaining enterprise, to […]
When the second generation son is taking over the family business from a founding parent, and the son has a serious drinking or drug problem, who is going to confront him? One out of two American family businesses will have to deal with a family-related addiction problem within the company, according to a 2012 study […]
Can brothers and sisters really work together? Or is there always an underlying rivalry, dating back to the worst of childhood rants: “Mom always liked you best!”
By the United States Small Business Administration was that family-owned businesses account for 90% of all businesses in the United States
What does an awe-inspiring national park in the sunset-hued Arizona desert have in common with a family-owned business? Quite a bit, it turns out…
Universities are studying “the family business”. Fairleigh Dickinson University, in New Jersey, established the O. Berk Company Family Business Forum in 1992.
