How to Bowl a Strike

Bowling, which has been regarded by big-city sophisticates as a small-town or suburban sport, invaded Manhattan last week with a bang. The Grand Central Bowl Co. announced it will build a $3,000,000 bowling center at Grand Central Terminal in the airspace over the 42nd Street waiting room.

As expected, the equipment for the new center will be supplied by Chicago's Brunswick Corp. But Brunswick's boss is a man who believes bowling is not everything. Since Benjamin E. ("Ted") Bensinger took over in 1954, he has turned what was a faltering firm producing only bowling and billiard equipment into one of the fastest-growing U.S. companies--with a line of products ranging from hospital beds to motorboats. Sales have risen from $33 million to $275 million last year; earnings from $692,000 to $26.8 million. Sales for 1960 are expected to exceed $350 million. Reflecting the rise, Brunswick's stock has increased in value 27-fold.

Awkward Period. Ted Bensinger, a great-grandson of the founder of the company (formerly called Brunswick-Balke-Collender Co.), was company president and second-in-command to his elder brother Bob, the chairman, when he became worried about Brunswick's almost total dependence on its bowling business. In the early 1950s he pushed through a small diversification program, turning out aircraft components and school furniture. But before he could do more, his _ worst fears came true. American Machine & Foundry Co. invaded the bowling market with its automatic Pinspotter, which eliminated pin boys--and started bowling on its boom. To exploit its beachhead, A.M.F. also brought out a full line of bowling equipment and threatened to force Brunswick out of the market. Ted decided that his brother was not using the right tactics to fight the threat. Says Ted: "I went to him and convinced him that I should take over." After a brief period of "awkwardness," Ted became chief executive officer, and Bob agreed to stay on as chairman.

Ted Bensinger went to work to develop an automatic pin setter of his own. Brunswick had experimented for years with automatic pin setters, but decided they were too expensive to produce--until A.M.F. proved this judgment wrong. So Bensinger organized a crash program, in 18 months put Brunswick's machine on the market.

As the new pin setter caught on, Brunswick's stock began to climb, and Bensinger found it easy to trade the stock for new companies. He took over nine firms, including St. Louis' A. S. Aloe Co., the nation's second largest distributor of laboratory and hospital supplies (first: American Hospital Supply Corp.), MacGregor Sport Products Inc., and Owens Yacht Co., the second biggest U.S. builder of cabin cruisers, behind Chris-Craft. With the new companies, the bowling division's share of the company's total sales has dropped from 75% to about 60% in the past two years. Nor is Bensinger's expansion program complete. He is now studying more than 100 firms for possible acquisition and is busy setting up factories and bowling centers in Europe and Australia.

Bensinger is a hard boss. He has put a vice president over each of Brunswick's six divisions, told them they would get fat bonuses if they did well and would not be around if they did not. Said Bensinger flatly: "I am very demanding. If anyone loafs on his oars, he will have to move over and make room for someone else."

An expert in management, he always thinks there is more to learn. He attends the seminar for chief executives at Colgate University each year, and takes his higher-echelon executives (average age: 43) to out-of-the-way resorts for several days of intensive soul searching, often splits them up into groups for what he calls war games. (The customary enemy: A.M.F.) If a plant lags in production, Bensinger likes to take a hand at running it to see if he can iron out the trouble.

Before the Bulls. Ruddy and trim (6 ft., 170 Ibs.), Bensinger likes sports and travel almost as much as his job. He has shot pigeons with Ernest Hemingway in Cuba, sipped wine with Pablo Picasso in Paris, played golf with Sam Snead. An aficionado, he has run before the bulls in Pamplona's festival of San Fermin and ried out his cape work against calves on [uan Belmonte's ranch in Spain. He has ished all over the world, once fired into a flight of blue-winged teal and killed eleven with a single shot. He even finds time to 30wl occasionally, once rolled a 286 game. On his 3^-acre estate in Highland Park, [11. he has a tennis court, swimming pool and dog kennels. The main feature of a ten-room apartment on Chicago's LtfKte Shore Drive is his bullfighting room, complete with a mounted bull's head.

All this is not enough. He is now negotiating to buy the fishing rights for a six-mile stretch of the famed Restigouche River in New Brunswick, where he hopes to set up a camp and catch the big Atlantic salmon that course up the stream each year. He can afford it: since Brunswick's stock has been on its steady climb, the 360,976 shares owned by him and his wife are worth over $25 million.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.