BNS Co. Announces Agreement to Sell Rhode Island Property.

Business Editors

NORTH KINGSTOWN, R.I.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 29, 2003

BNS Co. (OTCBB:BNSXA) announced today the signing of an agreement for the sale of the Company's North Kingstown, R.I. property for $20.2 million. The buyer is Wasserman RE Ventures LLC, a Providence based developer with interests in properties throughout the U.S. The property consists of the former international headquarters for Brown and Sharpe Manufacturing Company (the name was changed to BNS Co. in April 2001), a Rhode Island icon and one of the oldest corporations in America. The Company was founded in 1833, just seven years after the death of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. It has been in continuous operation since then, but in recent years has been gradually selling its operating units. The North Kingstown property represents one of the last assets remaining in the Company. It also holds a gravel extraction and land fill operation in the U.K. which it intends to sell as well.

Since this transaction represents the sale of substantially all of BNS Co.'s assets under the Delaware General Corporation Law, it is contingent on the approval of the stockholders. The Company has scheduled its annual stockholders meeting for 10:30 am on July 28, 2003, at the North Kingstown facility, at which time it will ask for a stockholder vote approving the sale.

The sale of the North Kingstown and U.K. properties are part of the Company's strategy to dissolve and adopt a plan for liquidation, which will be presented for stockholder approval at a later meeting. Such a plan may involve the establishment of a liquidating trust and payment or provision for payment of claims against its assets, and then making one or more liquidating distributions to stockholders (or to the liquidating trust). No estimate of the timing and amount of any liquidating distributions can be made at this time, in part because the amount available for distribution may depend on the amount of the Company's assets required to be retained to pay uncertain future liabilities by order of the Delaware Court of Chancery, if that avenue of liquidation is later selected by the Company as part of its plan of dissolution and liquidation. Also, it is not yet certain when the U.K. property will be sold.

For further information, refer to the Company's Form 10K filed with the SEC in March, and Form 10Q for the first quarter of 2003 filed earlier today. The Company will also be filing shortly its preliminary proxy statement for the annual stockholders' meeting, which will contain a more detailed description of the transaction. A copy of all filings may be obtained from the SEC's EDGAR web site, www.sec.gov, or by contacting: Michael Warren, President and Chief Executive Officer, telephone [phone]. The Company does not maintain a web site.