Are family firms’ export relationships more persistent?

This paper examines the persistence of family firms’ international relationships. We theoretically argue how socioemotional wealth’s gains and losses balancing process supported by network closure allows family firms to develop more persistent relationships with their foreign partners than their non-family counterparts. Our study empirically tests this hypothesis and confirms that export relationship survival is higher in family firms than in their non-family counterparts. We further show that this difference is magnified during economic crises or when operating in culturally distant markets. • The export survival of 45,850 firms and 16,098 family firms is studied. • Family firms have longer export relationships than non-family firms. • Longer export survival persists after neutralizing context-related heterogeneity. • Family socioemotional balancing and network mechanisms support ties’ persistence • We add a novel governance-related insight to the export-survival literature.