🔒Diversification key to Clinton-based electric grills, cooktops maker Kenyon International’s growth

Fire and boats don’t mix.

Just ask Phil Williams, co-owner and president of Kenyon International, a Clinton-based manufacturer.

“My partners and I, we have an extensive background in the marine industry, and we have seen boats burn to the water line because of people doing stupid things,” he said. “It’s terrible to witness.”

While his privately held business has been based in Connecticut for more than 90 years, it has gone through several changes before ultimately becoming what it is today — a manufacturer of electric grills and ceramic glass cooktops for marine and other uses.

“Electric grills are much safer,” Williams said. “When we originally started designing our electric grill, it was specifically for the marine marketplace.

“We didn’t want anything that was going to be dangerous to use on a boat,” he continued. “So, everything that we put into designing our grills is to make it the easiest to use, easiest to clean, and safest product.”

Dozens of patents

Kenyon didn’t start as an electric grill maker.

It was founded in 1931 by Theodore “Ted” Kenyon to make precision instruments for aviation and marine use. Kenyon’s first patent — the company now has more than 70 — was for a boat speedometer.

He also had a background in aviation, working for Grumman (now Northrop Grumman) as a pilot flying around the country to demonstrate its autopilot system.

He later met and married Cecil “Teddy” Kenyon, who shared his love of flying. She won the National Sports Women Flying Championship in 1933, and worked as a test pilot during World War II, according to the company’s website.

Together in 1953, the couple founded Kenyon Laboratories Inc. in Lyme, where they designed and manufactured instruments and control equipment for aircraft and boats. Eventually, that also included creating cooktops and alcohol stoves for boats.

By 1961, however, Kenyon Laboratories faced bankruptcy. It “found a new lease on life,” though, by selling gyrostabilizers under the new company name, Ken-Lab Inc.

Meaningful growth

By the 1980s, Ken-Lab had been acquired by a larger company, International Marine Industries (IMI), which grew the cooktop business. It also acquired, in 1988, a St. Petersburg, Fla.-based company called Crosby that had been launched by Williams, who had designed a new marine refrigeration system.

Eight years later, Williams and some friends bought Kenyon from IMI and relocated it to Clinton. At that time, the company had about 20 employees and produced items solely for the marine industry.

“When we bought the company in ‘96, we started looking at what our strengths and our weaknesses were,” Williams said. “We were determined to be able to take this organization that we had and actually grow this in a meaningful way.”

That meant looking into other markets, which led Kenyon to develop products for extended-stay hotels.

“We started developing our cooktops so that they would fit into small kitchenettes, whether that be for retiring Baby Boomers or in any other application,” Williams said. “Now we are the leading supplier to the hotel industry for their extended-stay flags — Marriott, Hilton, IHG (InterContinental Hotel Group). Any hotel that has properties where they put kitchenettes in, we’re a supplier to them.”

In fact, he said, that is now the biggest segment of Kenyon’s business.

It’s not, however, the only way Kenyon diversified. It also supplies cooktops for housing to all branches of the U.S. military, as well as for academic housing, assisted living facilities and RVs. It also works with homebuilders, providing both cooktops and electric grills.

The diversification was important to the company’s survival, Williams said. “We needed to have three legs to this stool so that we wouldn’t fall over.”

Signature Grill

The electric grill business for maritime use started in earnest in 2005, when Kenyon designed and manufactured a grill specifically for the marine marketplace.

The company produces electric grills in a variety of designs and sizes, ranging from portable to built-in. Last month, it introduced the Signature Grill, which Williams lauded for its design.

“I’ve seen a lot of really nice grills, but this one, in all the features that it includes, far surpasses anything that I’ve ever seen produced by any company anywhere,” he said.

The Signature Grill is powered by two independent 1,500-watt elements operating at 240 volts with 13 amps. It features a lid with three layers of stainless steel that includes vents in the middle layer to allow air to move through, keeping most of the heat from reaching the outside layer.

While the lid gets warm, it doesn’t get hot enough to burn like a gas or charcoal grill lid would, Williams said.

The lid is also removable and dishwasher safe.

Other features include an optional patented rotating handle that has a built-in, high-intensity LED light that illuminates the entire grill surface, and a digital temperature control system that “can actually dial in the temperature you want the grilling surface to be,” he said.

The temperature also can be locked so children can’t change it, he added.

For all of its grills and cooktops, Kenyon uses U.S.-produced materials whenever possible, including all of the metal. “Some of the parts are brought in from overseas only because nobody in the United States is making it,” Williams said.

Since Kenyon mostly sells its products directly to manufacturers, the military, hotels or builders, that did not allow it to develop “a strong network of brick-and-mortar resellers,” Williams said, while adding that has now become a focus to help the company grow.

Kenyon recently developed a relationship with West Marine, a Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based chain of boating supply and fishing retail stores, he said. West Marine has placed Kenyon grills in 13 of its stores, including one in Old Saybrook.

Overall, Kenyon products are sold in about 30 locations, including nine in New York, two in New Jersey, and one each in California, Louisiana, Maryland, North Carolina and Texas.

“While our network is currently small, there is a lot of room for growth in that area, which we intend to pursue heavily over the next few years and beyond,” Williams said.

Really scary

Like most manufacturers, the pandemic presented challenges for Kenyon.

When Connecticut started shutting down most businesses, Kenyon was able to remain open because it manufactures cooktops for the military, making it a government supplier.

“The pandemic was really scary as a business owner,” Williams said. “Our cooktop business declined during the pandemic because so many of our accounts around the country had to stop the construction on their facilities. But the grill business went through the roof. People wanted to update their outdoor kitchens, or build an outdoor kitchen.”

The marine industry also experienced growth in boat sales, which boosted Kenyon’s business.

The company now employs 53 people, and Williams, who declined to disclose annual revenue figures, said Kenyon added more sales people earlier this year.

“We’ve got a very good crew,” he said. “A lot of them have been with us for many, many years.”

He added that Kenyon provides benefits that match those provided by submarine maker Electric Boat in Groton.

“We have to, because we’re competing against them for engineers, for workers,” Williams said. “We do well making sure our employees are taken care of.”