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Golf Car Options
B & B Golf Carts Decks Out Carts For Street Use
When Jill Misner had her husband put a box on the
back of a golf cart for use around their property, she
really didn’t think much of it. That is, until a passerby
asked to buy it. Jill’s brother-in-law Toby found another
cart and not long after mounting another box made
from lumber, this cart also sold. A business was born.
Twelve years later, Misner’s company, B & B Golf
Carts, sells an average of one souped-up, modified or
hot rod cart a day and keeps several family members
busy, modifying and delivering golf carts for a number
of non-course uses.
“Golfers are not our main customers,” explains Bill
Misner, Jill’s father-in-law, who moved from Hoope-
ston after retirement to work in the family business,
which is located just off of U.S. 51 in Makanda.
He explained that the company’s carts are especially
popular in smaller communities where ordinances
allow golf carts on city streets. “We put the street legal
light kit on them, add backseats, paint them and put
fancy wheels and tires on them.”
Misner says the company works with both gasoline
and electric-powered carts. The electric ones are
more popular, he says.
Bill says practically all of the carts are used, having
completed a term of service at private golf courses.
Following the course’s lease, a third party company
sells them to B & B, where they are stripped down
to the chassis and completely rebuilt.
A basic refurbished cart runs about $2,000. Bill says
those with lift kits, lights, custom upholstery and
radios can run $7,000 or more.
“It just depends on what you want to do and what
you want to put on them,” Bill says, adding that
many farmers are buying the carts and using them
for chores instead of all-terrain vehicles. He says B &
B once set up a display in the vendor area of a farm
equipment show, just to build awareness of their
carts. “They boys kept coming back to get more
carts. We had a really good run there.”
B & B uses local craftspeople for the custom uphol-
stery, paint schemes and vinyl wraps. “This really is
a Southern Illinois business,” Jill explains.
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Thanks to word-of-mouth and internet sales, the busi-
ness sells carts in a large geographic area.
“Toby’s made deliveries to Fort Worth, the Wisconsin
Dells even out to Pennsylvania,” Bill says. “Our main
focus, however, is probably Illinois and the St. Louis
area.”
He says B & B is willing to try new things just to please
customers. He tells of “stretching” a golf cart to allow
for three rows of seats and the company’s website
features photographs of golf carts with custom bodies
which make them look like classic automobiles.
He says that a recent delivery featured a John Deere
yellow and green color scheme, others feature cus-
tom-painted bodies.
“Almost anything a customer can imagine, we can do,”
he says.
CONTACT
B & B Golf Carts
503 Hartline Road
Makanda, IL 62958
618-713-3905
www.bbgolfcarts.com