Top Performing Companies For 2016

Top Performing Companies For 2016: Brunswick Corp (BC)

Brunswick Corporation (Brunswick), incorporated on December 31, 1907, is a worldwide designer, manufacturer and marketer of recreation products, including marine engines, boats, fitness equipment and bowling and billiards equipment. Brunswick's engine products include outboard, sterndrive and inboard engines; trolling motors; propellers; engine control systems, and marine parts and accessories. The Company's boat offerings include fiberglass boats; sportfishing convertibles and motoryachts; offshore fishing boats; aluminum fishing boats, and pontoon and deck boats. Brunswick's fitness products include both cardiovascular and strength training equipment for the commercial and consumer markets. Brunswick's bowling products include capital equipment, aftermarket and consumer goods. The Company also sells a range of billiards tables and other gaming tables and accessories. In addition, the Company owns and operates Brunswick bowling family entertainment centers in the United States and other countries. In August 2013, Brunswick Corporation completed the sale of the Hatteras and CABO brands of motoryachts and sportfishing convertibles to Navis HCY Acquisition.

The Company, through its Brunswick Financial Services Corporation (BFS) subsidiary, owns a 49% interest in a joint venture, Brunswick Acceptance Company, LLC (BAC). CDF Ventures, LLC (CDFV), a subsidiary of GE Capital Corporation, owns the remaining 51%. Under the terms of the joint venture agreement, BAC provides secured wholesale inventory floorplan financing to the Company's engine and boat dealers.

Marine Engine Segment

Mercury Marine manufactures and markets a range of sterndrive propulsion systems, inboard engines and outboard engines under the Mercury, Mercury MerCruiser, Mariner, Mercury Racing, Mercury SportJet and Mercury Jet Drive, MotorGuide, A! xius and Zeus brand names. In addition, Mercury Marine manufactures and markets marine pa rts and accessories under the Quicksilver, Mercury Precision! Parts, Mercury Propellers, Attwood, Land 'N' Sea, Kellogg Marine Supply, Diversified Marine Products, Sea Choice and MotorGuide brand names, including marine electronics and control integration systems, steering systems, instruments, controls, propellers, trolling motors, service parts and marine lubricants. Mercury Marine's sterndrive engines, inboard engines and outboard engines are sold to independent boat builders, local, state and foreign governments, and to the Company's Boat segment. In addition, Mercury Marine's outboard engines are sold to end-users through a global network of more than 7,000 marine dealers and distributors, specialty marine retailers and marine service centers.

Mercury Marine, through Cummins MerCruiser Diesel Marine LLC (CMD), a joint venture between Brunswick's Mercury Marine division and Cummins Marine, a division of Cummins Inc., supplies integrated diesel propulsion systems to the worldwide recreational and commercial marine markets, including the Company's Boat segment. Mercury Marine manufactures two-stroke OptiMax outboard engines ranging from 75 to 300 horsepower, all of which feature Mercury's direct fuel injection (DFI) technology, and four-stroke outboard engine include Verado, a collection of supercharged outboards ranging from 150 to 350 horsepower, and Mercury Marine's naturally aspirated four-stroke outboards, ranging from 2.5 to 150 horsepower including the introduction of the 150 FourStroke, which is quickly becoming known for its light weight, fuel efficiency and performance. In addition, most of Mercury's sterndrive and inboard engines are available with catalyst exhaust monitoring and treatment systems.

Mercury Marine's sterndrive and outboard engines are produced domestically in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, with outboard engines also produced internationally in! China an! d Japan. Mercury Marine manufactures 40, 50 and 60 horsepower four-stroke outboard engi nes in a facility in China, and produces smaller outboard en! gines in ! Japan pursuant to a joint venture with its partner, Tohatsu Corporation. CMD manufactures diesel marine propulsion systems in South Carolina.

Mercury Marine also operates a remanufacturing business for engines and service parts in Wisconsin. In addition, Mercury Marine has an equity ownership interest in a company that manufactures boats under the brand names Bella, Flipper and Aquador in Finland. Mercury Marine also has an interest in a company that manufactures boats under the brand names Bella, Flipper and Aquador in Finland. Mercury Marine's parts and accessories distribution businesses include Land 'N' Sea, Kellogg Marine Supply and Diversified Marine Products. These businesses are the distributors of marine parts and accessories throughout North America.

Boat Segment

The Boat Group consists of the boat brands, such Sea Ray yachts, sport yachts, sport cruisers and runabouts; Bayliner sport cruisers and runabouts; Meridian mot oryachts; Boston Whaler, Lund and Trophy fiberglass fishing boats, and Crestliner, Cypress Cay, Harris FloteBote, Lowe, Lund, Princecraft, Suncruiser and Triton aluminum fishing, utility, pontoon and deck boats. The Boat Group also includes a commercial and governmental sales unit that sells products to commercial customers, as well as the United States Government and state, local and foreign governments. The Boat Group procures most of its outboard engines, gasoline sterndrive engines and gasoline inboard engines from Brunswick's Marine Engine segment.

The Boat Group has active manufacturing facilities in Florida, Indiana, Minnesota, Missouri, North Carolina, Tennessee, Canada, Mexico and Portugal, as well as additional inactive manufacturing facilities in Florida, Maryland, North Carolina and Tennessee. The Boat Group utilizes contract manufacturing faci! lities in! Argentina and Poland. The Boat Group has constructed a manufacturing plant in Joinville, Santa C atarina, Brazil, which has nearly 150,000 square feet of man! ufacturin! g space. The Boat Group's products are sold to end-users through a worldwide network of approximately 2,850 dealers and distributors, each of which carries one or more of Brunswick's boat brands.

Fitness Segment

Brunswick's Fitness segment consists of its Life Fitness division (Life Fitness), which designs, manufactures and markets a range of cardiovascular fitness equipment (including treadmills, total body cross-trainers, stair climbers and stationary exercise bicycles) and strength-training equipment under the Life Fitness and Hammer Strength brands. Life Fitness' commercial sales customers include health clubs, fitness facilities operated by professional sports teams, the military, governmental agencies, corporations, hotels, schools and universities. Consumer products are available at specialty retailers, select mass merchants, sporting goods stores, through international distributors, and on Life Fitness' Website. The Fitness segment 's principal manufacturing facilities are located in Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota and Hungary. Life Fitness distributes its products worldwide from regional warehouses and production facilities.

Bowling & Billiards Segment

The Bowling & Billiards segment consists of the Brunswick Bowling & Billiards division (BB&B). BB&B is a worldwide designer, manufacturer and marketer of bowling products. BB&B's bowling products business designs, manufactures and markets a variety of bowling products, including capital equipment (such as automatic pinsetters and scoring devices), bowling balls and aftermarket products (such as lane machines, pinsetter parts, lane conditioners and lane cleaners). Through licensing arrangements, BB&B also offers an array of bowling consumer products, including bowling shoes, bags and accessories.

BB&B! operates! 95 bowling centers in the United States, Canada and Europe. BB&B retail bowling centers offer bowling and, depending on size and location, may also offer activities a! nd facili! ties: restaurants, lounges, snack bars, billiards, video and redemption games, laser tag, pro shops and meeting and party rooms. Of the Company's 95 bowling centers, 42 have been converted into Brunswick Zones, which are bowling centers that offer an array of active entertainment activities for its guests. BB&B designs and/or markets billiards tables, table tennis tables, air powered table hockey games, billiard balls, cues and other gaming tables, as well as game room furniture and related accessories, under the Brunswick and Contender brands. BB&B's primary manufacturing and distribution facilities are located in Michigan, Wisconsin, Hungary and Mexico. Brunswick's bowling and billiards products are sold through a variety of channels, including distributors, dealers, mass merchandisers, bowling centers and retailers, and directly to consumers on the Internet and through other outlets.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Seth Jayson]

  Basic guidelines
  In this series, I examine inventory using a simple rule of thumb: Inventory increases ought to roughly parallel revenue increases. If inventory bloats more quickly than sales grow, this might be a sign that expected sales haven't materialized. Is the current inventory situation at Brunswick (NYSE: BC  ) out of line? To figure that out, start by comparing the company's inventory growth to sales growth. How is Brunswick doing by this quick checkup? At first glance, not so great. Trailing-12-month revenue increased 3.0%, and inventory increased 8.4%. Comparing the latest quarter to the prior-year quarter, the story looks decent. Revenue increased 3.7%, and inventory increased 8.4%. Over the sequential quarterly period, the trend looks healthy. Revenue grew 19.9%, and inventory grew 5.0%.

• [By Seth Jayson]

  Calling all ca! sh flows When you are trying to buy the market's best stocks, it's worth checking up on your companies' free cash flow once a quarter or so, to see whether it bears any relationship to the net income in the headlines. That's what we do with this series. Today, we're checking in on Brunswick (NYSE: BC  ) , whose recent revenue and earnings are plotted below.

source from Top Stocks For 2015:http://www.topstocksblog.com/top-performing-companies-for-2016.html