Keeping a Business in the Family

The odds are stacked against the family that wants to keep a business going for a second or third generation. Death taxes, rising real-estate prices, disinclined heirs, sibling squabbles . . . the obstacles are many and varied.

How delightful, then, to learn that Brandman's, the paint store we patronized when I was a kid, is celebrating its centennial in Norwalk, Connecticut.

Is it just coincidence that one of the last remaining real (that is, non-tourist) businesses in Portsmouth, New Hampshire is also a paint store?

F. A. Gray's somewhat dated web site boasts that the business is 102 years old. The date of founding, however, is listed as 1902, which makes Gray's 105.

Questions for trust officers:

What's the oldest family business is your marketing area?

What's the oldest family business with which your fiduciary team has been involved as executor or trustee?

(Extra credit if said business smells of turpentine.)