Bob Shaw announced in July 2006 that he would step down as CEO of Shaw Industries after nearly 50 years at the company's helm.
In 1958, Shaw took over Star Dye, which his father had bought a dozen years prior. As Shaw Industries, the company had $43 million in sales and 900 employees when it went public in 1971. Shaw Industries made the Fortune 500 list in 1985.
In 2000, billionaire investor Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway bought most of Shaw Industries for $2 billion. Berkshire bought the rest of the company two years later for another $355 million.
Shaw stepped away from his namesake company in 2005, but just five years later, at nearly 80, he got back in the game when he launched Engineered Floors. That company now has more than 3,600 employees.