Historical Business Data provides year-over-year business information from 1997 through the most recently completed year.

The dataset is compiled from annual point-in-time snapshots, each including only businesses that were operating at the time. If a business no longer appears in subsequent snapshots, it is generally interpreted as having closed in the prior year.

Each year is represented as its own record, with records sharing a persistent infogroup_id across years, while each snapshot year is uniquely identified by a historical_id, enabling tracking of business presence and change over time.

In this example:

• The infogroup_id = 123456789 appears in the 2004 and 2005 snapshots.
• Each year has its own Historical ID (infogroup_id + historical_year + historical_month)
• The business does not appear in the 2006 snapshot. As a result, the business is generally interpreted as having closed between 2005 and 2006.