2000 Ig Nobel Economics Prize winner Sun Myung Moon, having unified and dominated the mass marriage industry, is revitalizing and dominating another industry: American sushi. An April 11, 2006 Chicago Tribune report says:
Adhering to a plan Moon spelled out more than three decades ago in a series of sermons, members of his movement managed to integrate virtually every facet of the highly competitive seafood industry. The Moon followers’ seafood operation is driven by a commercial powerhouse, known as True World Group. It builds fleets of boats, runs dozens of distribution centers and, each day, supplies most of the nation’s estimated 9,000 sushi restaurants….
Reverend Moon’s Ig Nobel citation (in 2000) explained that he won his Ig:
for bringing efficiency and steady growth to the mass-marriage industry, with, according to his reports, a 36-couple wedding in 1960, a 430-couple wedding in 1968, an 1800-couple wedding in 1975, a 6000-couple wedding in 1982, a 30,000-couple wedding in 1992, a 360,000-couple wedding in 1995, and a 36,000,000-couple wedding in 1997.
(Thanks to Metafilter for bringing this to our attention, and to Mark Schreiber for bringing an unrelated sushi video to our attention.)