His father was an affluent landlord in the farming village of Wasa (part of present-day Wakayama city) and was one of the wealthiest men of his community.

During this time, Matsushita was introduced to one of his sister's friends, Mumeno Iue, and after a short courtship married her.

Matsushita would have eventually become bankrupt but he was "saved by an unexpected order for a thousand insulator plates for electric fans.

The early years of the company were difficult: he once had to pawn his wife's kimono when he found himself short on money.

Matsushita learned a very important lesson in terms of growing a company while he was trying to introduce his bicycle lamp to wholesalers.

As a result, Matsushita began devising ways to create sales channels for his products by concentrating less on manufacturing and more on building a sales force, which led to a retail store network and finally placed Matsushita's company on the map in Japan's electrical manufacturing and retail industry.

From 1950 to 1973, Matsushita's company became one of the world's largest manufacturers of electrical goods, sold under well-known trademarks including Panasonic and Technics.

In retirement, Matsushita focused on developing and explaining his social and commercial philosophies and wrote 44 published books.

One of his books, entitled "Developing A Road To Peace And Happiness Through Prosperity", sold over four million copies.

In 1979, at the age of 84, he founded the Matsushita School of Government and Management [ja] to train the future politicians and businessmen of Japan.

[citation needed] Konosuke Matsushita was honoured at Stanford University by endowing a Professorship in International Strategy and Management.