zippers

While researching CurtainWall Systems made by YKK AP for my current project I accidentally went to their main website and was pleasantly surprised to find that YKK not only makes CurtainWall, but are also the zipper monopoly of the world. I'm sure you've looked down at your coat zipper or the zipper on your jeans and noticed the emblazoned YKK letters.

Wanting to know more I checked out the Wikipedia entry for the YKK Group and this is what I found out:

The initials YKK stands for Yoshida Kōgyō Kabushiki-kaisha (吉田工業株式会社) and the original company was established in 1934.

It's made up of a group of Japanese manufacturing companies. They are best known for zippers (they are the world's largest producers) but they also make fasteners, architectural products, and machinery.

Zippers!