Obit: Arthur Bronner Sr., 89, top name for black mane

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ATLANTA ? Arthur Bronner Sr. traveled town to town, beauty shop to beauty shop selling Sister C.J. Walker hair products before becoming a founder of Bronner Bros. which, for some, is the very definition of black hair care products.

Mr. Bronner's sales route became the distribution network for Bronner Bros., founded in 1947, said his son, Art Bronner III of Norcross, Ga.

"He knew the back roads of Georgia like nobody's business," he said.

Mr. Bronner Sr. and his brother, the late Nathaniel Bronner, started the company by selling other brands and moved into developing their own products in the 1970s.

"Dad realized if they could make X amount of profit selling other people's products how much more they could make selling their own," his son said. Their first was BB Hair Food.

Though Bronner Bros. sold other brands to beauty shops, beauticians renamed them, saying, "I want some BB," said his sister-in-law, Robbie Bronner of Atlanta. "When we came out with our first product, we knew it had to be named BB."

Today, the company has 300 employees and offers more than 50 original hair care products. Its annual trade show draws thousands of stylists from around the country.

Arthur Edward Bronner Sr., 89, of Atlanta, died of congestive heart failure Wednesday at Piedmont Hospital.

When it came to business, the original Bronner brothers complemented each other. They involved their brothers and sisters in the business and over time included their own children, nieces and nephews, Art Bronner said. His father was executive senior vice president emeritus of the company.

"My father and uncle understood their strengths and weaknesses," he said. "They just balanced each other out. In a lot of ways, they were inseparable."

Ms. Bronner credits her brother-in-law for the company's inroad into retail sales as well as beauty shops.

Mr. Bronner, whom many call Mr. A.E., grew up with 10 brothers and sisters who all worked hard on the family's farm in Kelly in Jasper County. After serving in the U.S. Army, he owned a dry cleaning store in Cleveland. When his brother said he wanted him to help start a business, Mr. Bronner gave up his store and returned to Georgia, his son said.

"Dad, as a specialty, learned how to hang signs in beauty shops," his son said. Mr. Bronner would greet the owner and stylists, tell them about the new product sign, hang it for them, clean the wall if it needed it and place the signs where people couldn't miss them, like in a bathroom, he said.

His winning ways won Bronner Bros. more than customers. When product manufacturers such as Revlon had a sales competition, Bronner Bros. always came out a winner, his son said. "His rapport with the hair stylists was so strong, they'd win every time," he said.

The brothers just had business in their blood, said Dr. Julia Glass of Atlanta, another sister-in-law. "They always listened to each other. He retired about five years ago but still would go to the business, and they still listen to him," she said.

He was a leader in Wheat Street Baptist Church and had been president of the Men Who Usher for 18 years.

"You could always depend on him being frank and honest," Dr. Glass said. "He would give you advice even if you didn't want to hear it, because he thought you needed to hear it."

People heard a lot of his stories, too. "The Army, the farm, school ? he never forgot stories from way back," his son said.

"He was full of jokes," Dr. Glass said. "He would laugh at his stories more than the people he was telling it to."

Other survivors include four grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

Kay Powell writes for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.