Butler Manufacturing Company to acquire Hungarian fabricator.

KANSAS CITY, MO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 20, 1996--Butler Manufacturing Company announced today that it has signed a Letter of Intent to acquire a 90% interest in Beker Kft, a building systems fabricator located in Nyiregyhaza, Hungary. The transaction is expected to close in December 1996.

Beker was established in 1989 to supply framing systems to the Hungarian nonresidential building market. Beker sales in 1996 will total approximately 3 million U.S. dollars. Over 300 buildings have been constructed utilizing Beker framing systems.

Butler has been serving the Central and Eastern European market with building systems fabricated in Kirkcaldy, Scotland. Sales offices in Eschborn, Germany and Budapest, Hungary, have been working with a growing Butler Builder organization in Poland, Hungary, the Czech and Slovak Republics, and Eastern Germany. Customers have included both European firms and multinational companies such at Toys "R" Us, Inc., Pepsico Inc. and Alcoa.

Beker building systems will continue to be marketed and manufactured from the Nyiregyhaza facilities. Manufacturing capabilities to produce Butler building systems will be added within the same facility. The management team of this privately held firm will form the nucleus of an enlarged operation. Establishment of production in Hungary will reduce freight, import duties and taxes, and shorten delivery times. Butler and Beker Kft expect this new relationship will facilitate better service to customers and faster growth in the strengthening markets of Central and Eastern Europe.

Butler Manufacturing Company is the world's leading producer of pre-engineered building systems and is a supplier of specialty components and construction services for the nonresidential construction market with total sales of $826 million in 1995.

CONTACT: John Holland

Vice President - Finance

[phone]