The Beno J. Gundlach Company, named after its founder, was established in Belleville, IL in 1927. At the time, Beno’s brother, Bill, was a sales rep for a new type of roofing shingle that had recently been introduced to the U.S. market by the Johns Manville Corporation. At Bill’s request, Beno designed a manually operated cutter for roofing shingles. He received a U.S. patent soon after and manufactured the cutter in a small building in Belleville until the early 1930s.
During that time asphalt floor tiles were also introduced to the U.S. market. Several manufacturers asked Beno to modify his shingle cutter to work on this new tile format, marking the entrance of Gundlach to the floor covering installation tools market.