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I haven't read this yet. Too busy. Just wanted to post it so I didn't lose it.

Briggs & Stratton skips $6.7 million interest payment, awards $5 million to executives
Briggs & Stratton Corp. has chosen not to make a $6.7 million interest payment, but the company’s board of directors has voted to give executives and other key employees more than $5 million in cash retention awards, according to a filing with regulators.

Sounds like a "perfectly" working corporate mess. Key employees are the Sr VP's and such. NOT the workers on the factory floor doing all the work. Cash retention awards sounds nice. Probably tax free no doubt.

slomo

Don't be suprised to see executives jumping ship and popping golden parachutes. Then some sort of reorganization filing. If they can't sell off enough assets to stay liquid first thing is to stop paying bills and start dumping cash on the high ups then declare some sort of bankruptcy and reorganize. Welcome to america.

But first they raid the pension plan, then turn what's left of it over to the government. Assuming they still have a a pension plan that is. Lots of mumbo jumbo in the articles but the execs have to stay on board until next year to keep the cash, and they had their pay cut during the virus shut down. Hard to tell what's going on behind the curtains though.

Looks like Briggs is moving toward filing Chapter 11. Dumping the power equipment side of the business was step one.

looks like a legal thieft of money from creditor being done before they declare bankruptcy at the end of your financial year and shaft all of their suppliers.
And being al election year what are the chances of a government bail out in order to "Make America Great Again".
Please Mr President, we are bankrupt & will have to close all USA factories & outsorce to China without a government "loan" .

Well at least there are enough chineese parts for Briggs engines (carbs and coils) to keep the engines running when the OEM briggs parts prices go sky high like murray parts.

Clones will take over most every OPE soon.

bertsmobile1 said:

looks like a legal thieft of money from creditor being done before they declare bankruptcy at the end of your financial year and shaft all of their suppliers.
And being al election year what are the chances of a government bail out in order to "Make America Great Again".
Please Mr President, we are bankrupt & will have to close all USA factories & outsorce to China without a government "loan" .

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My thoughts as well Bert. Let the tax payers foot the bill again.. Harley Davidson did it with Regan presidency.

Like the Powerless........er..i mean Powermore crap engines.

While we have been pushing for specific anti-pheonixing laws down here for a very long time I am thankful we do not have a Chapter 11 down here.
The directors & CEO would be fined for insolvent trading and that would go back as far as the first year of an operating loss if they suddenly call in the administrators.
Any money paid to any of them other than a regular salary payment is forfeited and some have been personally bankrupted by the government if the money can not be returned to the company.
Then the fun starts. TAxman No 1 creditor, staff wages No 2 . staff superannuation ( similar to your pension ) is 3 then come the securred creditors followed by the unsecured ones.
Now what is supposed to happen is if any of the current directors or any company they are a director of buys the assets of the bankrupt business form the administrator, they also inherit all of the outstanding liabilities.

Considering the mess that Briggs was in last year I am surprised that they haven't already file Chapter 11.

Hammermechanicman said:

Well at least there are enough chineese parts for Briggs engines (carbs and coils) to keep the engines running when the OEM briggs parts prices go sky high like murray parts.

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If you are talking pre 2005 Murray there isn't the demand to drive parts production therefore price for production is high. Post 2010 since there was no Miurray from 2005-2010 prices can be blamed on Husqvarna and MTD.

ILENGINE said:

If you are talking pre 2005 Murray there isn't the demand to drive parts production therefore price for production is high. Post 2010 since there was no Miurray from 2005-2010 prices can be blamed on Husqvarna and MTD.

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I thought briggs was the major debt holder for unpaid engines and the bankruptcy court gave all murray assets to briggs.

Another once-great American brand down the tubes. Or, in some form, reinvented so that it’s identity is nothing but a name.

Almost all the residential brands have been sold off and turned to zombies. I love it when people say i bought a Troy Bilt because i wanted a good machine. More like Trash Bilt. Crapsman, Turdo, Briggs & Scrapem, and the list goes on. Sad day when the chicom honda clones are better made engines than the ones from "american" companies.

I'd rather pay a $60 for a coil that will last 20 years like the original, than $20-$30 every 2 years when the CC coil goes out.

Hammermechanicman said:

I thought briggs was the major debt holder for unpaid engines and the bankruptcy court gave all murray assets to briggs.

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Briggs owns the assets for Murray, and per the court agreement were not allowed to use the name for 5 years, which is where the Brute brand materialized. Since 2010 Briggs has licensed the Murray name to MTD and Husqvarna. From about 2010-2017 the low end push mowers sold at Walmart were manufactured, serviced and warranty through Husqvarna, and the high end Murray push mowers and the riders were manufactured, serviced and warrantied by MTD. Around 2018 it all became production of MTD. As part of the licensed agreement there are required to use Briggs engines.

It all comes down to the cheapness of the people who open their wallets to buy mowers.
All of the major brands have gone down the high volume low margin path in order to make their mower a few dollars cheaper than the equivalent mower made by another company.
Eventually no one is able to afford to fit locally made engines because the profit margins are so low and local makers can just not make a cheaper engine.
So the mower companies go to a fully imported engine, Briggs looses sufficient volume to wipe out the profit .
Once Tecumseh went, Briggs took over their place as the cheap engine alternative and by & large their fate was sealed .

Retailers like Wally & Lowes that have been allowed to become too big make the situation worse.
The free trade capitalist market system only works when all of the companies are of roughly equivalent size and tha market is fully informed.
Neither of these have existed since the 70's when accountants & economists took over management.

What is ironic is that Murray basically started the whole downward spiral. Briggs purchased Murray which was a major user of Tecumseh engines, and since Briggs became a competitor mower manufacturer with that bankruptcy purchase, MTD refused to used Briggs engines for a couple years, which is when MTD went to China to obtain their Powermore engine line and now MTD is building the Murray line for the past 10 years.

So my predictions are that MTD purchases the Murray name, and possibly gets Snapper when Simplicity is sold to Toro. Just personal thoughts.

Depends upon how you look t it.
In essence Briggs are only a componant supplier.
As factories chase lower prices for componants Briggs will be forever be squeezed to make a lower priced engine so their fate is sealed.
Selling off the whole goods divisions will only produce a temporary reprieve and put off the inevidable.

Immediatly post WW II the managemen thinking was controlling the entire production, called vertical intergration.
I will illustrate with BSA as that is what I know best.
They bought their suppliers from the coal mines right through to the steel suppliers, the tools used to make motorcycles and the trucks use to deliver them
The only bits they did not own were Amal carburettors ( 30% stake ) Jones / Dunlop / Singer ( wheel rims ) where they had a percentage in all of them & Lucas where they had no stake.
They owned the iron foundries that made the cylinder barrels and the aluminium foundries that cast the cankcases so even if their models failed & the competition out sold them, they had the profits from supplying their competitiors to fall back on plus the sale of non motorcycle related items, like Motoplas making plastic parts for the white goods industry or the forge making push bike parts for Raleigh ( who bought the push bike division in 1964 )
In the final 6 years, the non motorcycle entities were not only covering the losses of the motorcycle division but actually producing profits.

The USA went the other way, the catch cry was "own the market" so the idea was to either buy , merge with or bankrupt all of your competitors till you became the monopoly supplier and thus you could set the prices for the market.
Then we had all of the Harvard graduates ( yes it did come from Harvard ) who came out with the brilliant idea of "core business" so all of the big companies went gar gars selling off everything that was not directly making their product.
Thus companies like Briggs became assemblers rather than manufacturers , buying in as many parts as possible in order to force a cheaper price.
The next nail in the coffin was another Harvard idea "brand name value" so the brand name became an individual saleable entity divorced for the manufacture & distribution of the end product. The poster child for this was Sara Lea
In our domain think Ryobi, Mikata ( petrol ) etc. This saw a profusion of products bearing the brand name of well known companies just being a rebranded bought in product ( JD push mowers for instance ) most of which were some what sub standard.
Ultimately Horizontal intergration is a disaster waiting to happen because if that sector of the market suffers a prolonged down turn then you are stuffed big time, think car companies during the oil crisis.

HD saw this and after going to the wall, set themselves up to make a lot more of their motorcycle & supply parts into the general trade making handlebars & wheels .

IMHO if Briggs are going to survive as a company they need to keep making whole goods and in particular top end products like Simplicity and push the quality aspect over trying to make them cheap enough for HF or Wallies.
But marketing has to change & they need to make their dealers into distribution centres for on line purchasing so they can be reasonably price competative & retain their dealer network
Simple things like offering 10 year extended warranty provided servicing is done by the dealer over a 1 year standard warranty
And then the quality & longevity of the engines has to be increased so the Briggs engine becomes considered the top end engine, not the cheapest.

China has a long term plan to dominate the world and they are using the greed & corruption of Western businesses & people themselves to do it.
They had the post WWII history of Arabia , Japan, Singapore, HK & Korea to use to create business model that would lift the country into the 21st century without plunging them into the mass poverty of the British East India company days, and to date it is working perfectly.
The collapse of Tecumseh firstly made a market available for cheap & nasty Chinese engines and secondly it put price pressure on all of the remaining USA factories due to reduced volumes of USA / Canadian steel & aluminium pushing the local price up.

In the 2015 calendar year the biggest volume small engine maker was B & S with Honda distant second the next 5 were all from China then Kohler, Yamaha, Kawasaki & Suberu the around another 10 Chinese companies.
That was the last year of this particular analysis as it then changet to USA centric survey to make the non-Chinese sector look healthier than they are.
Liffan is the biggest engine maker if you include their motorcycle engines .

If Briggs goes under... would that affect Generac? I never can remember correctly if Briggs bought generac, or they started it and sold it.

I now see the Briggs & Stratton name on battery packs (82v) used in lawn and garden equipment from various companies and they have their own battery mower engine line now. No doubt Chinese crap - but sure not cheap.

But I've been putting together a 12 cu in Briggs engine for an old mower and it's pretty amazing how cheaply built that motor is, and they've sold millions of that exact basic engine. Looking at that cheap motor, cheap stamped steel deck, cheap plastic wheels, and the NOT cheap price tags on those mowers, somebody is making money for sure.

Scrubcadet10 said:

If Briggs goes under... would that affect Generac? I never can remember correctly if Briggs bought generac, or they started it and sold it.

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No Briggs was in the works to purchase Generac, and had a 5 year agreement to complete the purchase, but in the end Briggs just stole the generator technology and now Generac after purchasing 2-3 other companies is a larger company than before the Briggs agreement.

bertsmobile1 said:

inIMHO if Briggs are going to survive as a company they need to keep making whole goods and in particular top end products like Simplicity and push the quality aspect over trying to make them cheap enough for HF or Wallies.
And then the quality & longevity of the engines has to be increased so the Briggs engine becomes considered the top end engine, not the cheapest.

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Doesn't Briggs and Stratton own/offer Ferris and Snapper Pro and Vanguard engines for commercial mowers.

DK35vince said:

Doesn't Briggs and Stratton own/offer Ferris and Snapper Pro and Vanguard engines for commercial mowers.

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Ferris and Snapper/Snapper Pro are part of the Simplicity group which is supposed to be part of the sell off package. And Vanguard is staying for the commercial mowers for now. Briggs is keeping the engine line and the generator products but selling off OPE and pressure washers.

The "new" Briggs & Stratton emerged from bankruptcy today. This is a deal similar to GM. There is "old" Briggs carrying all the debt, and "new" Briggs being dept free. Not mentioned in the article is that Todd Teske is out as president and CEO. Also the previous mentioned sale of assets will not happen. All brands owned by Briggs will continue to be manufactured and sold by Briggs (Ferris, Snapper, Snapper Pro, Simplicity).

https://biztimes.com/briggs-stratton...capital-group/

That is if all f the suppliers who have been stiffed are willing to supply parts and in these times that is a big IF .
Hopefully Briggs will see the light and return Murray as a major manufacturer of store branded mowers ,naturally fitted with B & S engines exclusively thus becoming a direct competitor to MTD
As they are the engine makers they can then vertical intergrate and produce cheaper than MTD and perhaps force a rethink on the fitting of Loncin engines excluseivly to all MTD products .
Then they need to promote their own brands and make a clear distinction between the throw away domestics and top end products.
Long term top end is the only path to follow because mowers from China will just keep on getting cheaper and India has not even come on line yet .
The other thing that has to be done is bigger inventory of older parts and advertising to convince the public that they will always be able to fix their B & S engines and cast doubt on the supply of parts for the Loncin's fitted to Toro & MTD .
However it will be a big ask
I still am getting 6 month back orders on common parts like 31 series cam shafts .

I needed parts for a 20 year old Simplicity. Checked my ususal suppliers and no one had in stock so ordered and waited. A month later they came in. The parts were in plastic bags from Simplicity and put into Briggs and Stratton boxes. I will bet this whole parts thing gets worse before better. As much as some folks want to hate on aftermarket parts soon it may be the only way to keep equipment running.

Many years ago when cars went from standard headlamps to fancy plastic assemblies car mfgrs jacked the price to obscene levels as they were in very high demand by collision shops. In comes aftermarket with comparable quality for 1/3 the price. The car mfgrs cried foul and tried to get the government to ban them as unsafe. In the meantime they jacked the prices even higher. Same for tail light assemblies.

And I'm guessing the old stock holders have worthless paper now, but the company will reissue renamed shares and the new big shots will really cash in with stock options. Last a while before the roof just caves in.

And I have read all about those $800 headlight assemblies, buy a sealed beam for 4 bucks. And I'm not understanding why a LED light has to have a circuit board with 50 to 100 miniature surface mounted components? Supply DC current and it lights. I dunno.

Basically Briggs and KPS just screwed everyone. And now have to wait and see if KPS is just going to sell of the Briggs assets and close down Briggs or not. Not going to hold my breath as it looks terminal for Briggs.

Nearly half my Briggs parts are now being backordered. I even received one backorder that all I got was a box, packing list, a couple air bags, and no parts.

Hopefully the OEM suppliers will now sell into the aftermarket supply chain so we will get bigger range of aftermarket parts .
And yes you are 100% correct KPS will want their money back x 10 in a very short period of time but we will not hear about it till after they have sold down.
Virtually guarantee all real estate will be the first thing to go then KPS can regulate the "profit" by playing with the rent .

bertsmobile1 said:

Hopefully the OEM suppliers will now sell into the aftermarket supply chain so we will get bigger range of aftermarket parts .
And yes you are 100% correct KPS will want their money back x 10 in a very short period of time but we will not hear about it till after they have sold down.
Virtually guarantee all real estate will be the first thing to go then KPS can regulate the "profit" by playing with the rent .

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Stanley Black & Decker inc. will swoop in and purchase Briggs and MTD in a mega merger.

I'm surprised i haven't seen B&D Branded riding mowers, not made by, but branded

Doubt that Stanley will do this now when they could have bought the whole shooting match for 8¢ in the dollar last month.
Not going to pay KPS 200¢ in the dollar now .
Basically B & S as an engine maker is deceased.
MTD will not use B & S engines any more for political reasons ( supposedly ) unless B & S sell off all of the whole goods divisions which directly compete with MTD
Toro will not go back to B & S unless B & S can guarantee parts supply and come in under the price of the Loncins and that is not going to happen either .
Add to that ever increasing EPA regulations will force all petrol powered mower to go to EFI initally and battery ultimately .
Thus there is no long term future in making petrol powered small engines for anything else than top shelf commercial products.
And the buying market is too cheap to pay those prices in the numbers required to support efficient manufacturing.
Tecumseh engines were 2/3 the price of B & S engines and Tecumseh went down when smaller makers switched to imported engines and their volumes dropped.

High volume low margin is a massive gamble because eventually big players like Walmart force you to supply at a price under the manufacturing cost so you have to increase the price to the smaller retailers to remain profitable .
This works well for the Walmarts as they can now sell at a profit at a lower price than the corner mower shop can purchase mowers from the factory .
So in a very short time the corner shops switch to a different supplier , you then loose your entire profit and are bankrupt
AFAIK this is what happened to Noma and Murray .
BEcause companies like Walmart have been allowed, through political corruption , to become so dominant they can then control the information flow and mask the true cause by blaming warranty problems so appear to be the heros protecting the community where as all along they are the villians.

As a fully vertically intergrated company B & S have a future but that means going back to making most of the parts themselves and redesigning the engines to be fully robot assembled like the Kohler China factory has done with the courage single.
Push mower engines have no future so they will need to import all of them from their Chinese factory as no USA factory can make them at a price that is competative with the Chinese & Indian sourced engines and Joe Public will not pay $ 100 extra for a USA made engine particularly when they are sub standard to the imported engines.

Stanley black and decker currently own 20 percent in mtd with option to purchase the rest in 2021. We shall see...

Walmart killed Murray by trying to demand more products at a cheaper price. Murray was always designed to be a Walmart exclusive product(no market outside Walmart unlike MTD and Husqvarna). Their territory was the southeastern 1/4 of the US. Basically framed by the South of I-70 and east of the Mississippi river. MTD was north of I-70 and east of the Mississippi river, and Husqvarna was everything west of the Mississippi

And I agree with Bert that MTD will avoid Briggs engines unless they sell off their power equipment lines. Actually the MTD avoidance of Briggs started after the Murray bankruptcy and started the MTD made in China line which are basically Loncin engines. Briggs also kind of caused their own issues with the Murray and Brute lines over the last few years with them being supported by outside Chinese manufactures line Earthquake, Amerisun, and another company that is ,making some of the Murray push mowers that doesn't even have a viable website for customers to contact with parts or warranty issues.

And since Generac was one of the creditors I wonder what role they played in the Brute and Briggs and Stratton portable generator and pressure washer lines.

Interesting I was under the impression that Murray was a major manufacturer of mowers for other people.
They certainly made ride ons sold under the brands Victa, Rover, Pace , Parklander , Sentenial & some store only brands down here as well as plain Murray .
The Murray master parts catalogue has a paint finish prefix for just about every mower company I have ever heard of including Husqvarna, JD & Toro.
However this is for everything from tiny tiller through to garden tractors.

Bert there was a little bit of Craftsman product a few years ago, and they did market under the Stanley name for a short period which they treated as a separate dealer agreement, but was still sold exclusively through Walmart. There could of been some production for other brands, but they didn't sell under different brand name like MTD with the Bolens, Troybilt, Cub Cadet etc or Husqvarna with Poulan, Dixon, Redmax, Jonsered.

Toro is back using Kawasaki engines as well as their lochin engines. Seems they are drifting from Kohler.

That is what I read it as , Murray & Noma made mowers under contract for other marketing companies , Mower companies & store brands, none of which they owned , as well as for themselves .
At one time Noma also made mowers for all of the local brands as did MTD
In fact it was not uncommon for the local brands to have one or two models from each company in any single years range .
I do recall Victa selling MTD vari drive & manual geared mowers in a couple of deck sizes , Murray hydrodrives models in a couple of deck configurations side & rear throw & Noma 4 wheel steer models all at the same time .
The colours attached to different brands in the 1999 parts list I have are
Victa Green , Rover Blue , Rover Red , JD Yellow ( 3 of them ) Stiga Yellow , Husqvarna Orange , Sears Red , Toro Red , Viking Green , Viking Stihl Green , Stihl Green , JD Green , Hayters Green , Viking Stihl Grey , Yard King Yellow , K-Go red , Scotts Orange , Scotts Green , Bolens White , Sears Silver , Stiga Silver , Ingersol Red . J C Penny Yellow , Nauder Red , Massey Red .

SO from that the natural assumption was Murray must have made equiment on behalf of other companies or at least supplied finished parts to other companies.

Well I can confirm that the local Murray Ohio plant in Lawrenceburg, TN did at least made some of the Sears Craftsman mowers before they closed down. I seen that while servicing some of their credit union bank equipment. Any ways that been a long time ago now since Murray Ohio went out of business and Briggs snatched them up.