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Staffelter Hof Winery is Germany's oldest business, established in 862 under the Carolingian dynasty. It has continued to serve customers through dramatic changes in Europe, such as the Holy Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and both world wars. What characteristics enable a business to stand the test of time?
To help answer this question, BusinessFinancing.co.uk researched the oldest company still in business in almost every country and compiled the results into several CSV files. This dataset has been cleaned.
Having useful information in different files is a common problem. While it's better to keep different types of data separate for data storage, you'll want all the data in one place for analysis. You'll use joining and data manipulation to work with this data and better understand the world's oldest businesses.
The Data
businesses and new_businesses
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
business | Name of the business (varchar) |
year_founded | Year the business was founded (int) |
category_code | Code for the business category (varchar) |
country_code | ISO 3166-1 three-letter country code (char) |
countries
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
country_code | ISO 3166-1 three-letter country code (varchar) |
country | Name of the country (varchar) |
continent | Name of the continent the country exists in (varchar) |
categories
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
category_code | Code for the business category (varchar) |
category | Description of the business category (varchar) |
-- What is the oldest business on each continent?
WITH combined_business AS (
SELECT
c.continent,
c.country,
b.business,
b.year_founded
FROM businesses b
INNER JOIN countries c
ON b.country_code = c.country_code
),
oldest_per_continent AS (
SELECT
continent,
MIN(year_founded) AS oldest_year
FROM combined_business
GROUP BY continent
)
SELECT
cb.continent,
cb.country,
cb.business,
cb.year_founded
FROM combined_business cb
INNER JOIN oldest_per_continent opc
ON cb.continent = opc.continent
AND cb.year_founded = opc.oldest_year
ORDER BY cb.year_founded;
-- How many countries per continent lack data on the oldest businesses
-- Does including the `new_businesses` data change this?
WITH combined_business AS ( --this table will become a sub query
SELECT * FROM businesses
UNION ALL
SELECT * FROM new_businesses
)
SELECT continent, COUNT(country) countries_without_businesses
FROM (
SELECT * FROM countries c
LEFT JOIN combined_business cb
ON c.country_code = cb.country_code
WHERE business IS NULL
)t
GROUP BY continent
-- Which business categories are best suited to last over the course of centuries?
WITH old_business AS (
SELECT b.*, ca.category, c.continent
FROM businesses b
INNER JOIN categories ca
ON b.category_code = ca.category_code
INNER JOIN countries c
ON b.country_code = c.country_code
WHERE b.year_founded IS NOT NULL
)
SELECT
continent,
category,
MIN(year_founded) AS year_founded
FROM old_business
GROUP BY continent, category
ORDER BY year_founded;