Our research started with the following question: have longstanding family businesses been conducting sustainable development policies long before the word became a fashion. After presenting our methodology, we investigate the sustainable development concept and review the family business (FB) literature on longevity in light of the key questions related to sustainable development (SD). We then set out investigate the case of six family businesses which have been in operation for two generations or more. We interviewed 17 different family business owners and members, of six French family businesses, totaling 27 hours of interviews on the longevity of their company. Based on this, and occasionally on written documents, we set out to identify what factors family members associate with the longevity of their company and how these factors stand as regards to the FB and the SD literature.
