William Harrison "Bill" Binnie is an American industrialist, investment banker, and philanthropist, who is currently president of the Carlisle Capital Corporation,
president of the media company New Hampshire 1 Network and owner of Carlisle One Media. He is the former chairman of the Finance Committee for the
New Hampshire Republican State Committee
The New Hampshire Republican Party is the affiliate of the United States Republican Party in New Hampshire. Its executive committee is headed by Chairman Jim MacEachern.
Elected officials
Republicans have a state government trifecta in New Ha ...
,
and a former candidate for the Republican nomination for the U. S. Senate in 2010. He served as chairman of Carlisle Plastics, Inc. until that firm was sold to
Tyco International
Tyco International was a security systems company incorporated in the Republic of Ireland, with operational headquarters in Princeton, New Jersey, United States (Tyco International (US) Inc.). Tyco International was composed of two major busin ...
in September 1996.
Education
Binnie was born in Scotland and immigrated to the United States at the age of five.
He attended
Harvard University
Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
on a scholarship.
As a student, he was a research fellow for the ''Accounting Review'', a journal on finance and accounting. Upon graduation, he attended
Harvard Business School
Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate school, graduate business school of Harvard University, a Private university, private Ivy League research university. Located in Allston, Massachusetts, HBS owns Harvard Business Publishing, which p ...
, where he served as president of the Management Consulting Club. After graduation, he took a position as a consultant at
McKinsey & Co
McKinsey & Company (informally McKinsey or McK) is an American multinational strategy and management consulting firm that offers professional services to corporations, governments, and other organizations. Founded in 1926 by James O. McKinsey ...
.
Business career
Fresh out of graduation from Harvard, Binnie began to make a name for himself by buying and selling companies in collaboration with a wealthy investor for whom he had been doing financial research.
Binnie acquired the assets of Polytech, a
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 429,954 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the state's List of cities in Minnesota, most populous city. Locat ...
–based manufacturer of household and commercial plastics, including food storage bags and wraps,
trash bags, and plastic sheeting. Polytech made the "Ruffies" brand trash bag which actor/comedian
Jonathan Winters
Jonathan Harshman Winters III (November 11, 1925 – April 11, 2013) was an American comedian, actor, author, television host, and artist. He started performing as a stand up comedian before transitioning his career to acting in film and te ...
helped to make famous. Binnie also acquired
American Western
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, p ...
, a
Sioux Falls, South Dakota
Sioux Falls ( ) is the List of cities in South Dakota, most populous city in the U.S. state of South Dakota and the List of United States cities by population, 117th-most populous city in the United States. It is the county seat of Minnehaha Coun ...
–based private label manufacturer of similar products, along with four other plastics manufacturers that included a line of
coat hangers. He consolidated the six companies into
Carlisle Plastics, Inc., building a large corporation, employing thousands of workers.
He was chairman of the board from 1985 onwards and chief executive officer and President from 1985 to 1994. By 1996, he owned 62.5% of Carlisle's Class B shares making him the majority owner.
By the early 1990s, he was one of the youngest CEOs in
New York Stock Exchange
The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District, Manhattan, Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is the List of stock exchanges, largest stock excha ...
history and was featured in
Forbes Magazine
''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine founded by B. C. Forbes in 1917. It has been owned by the Hong Kong–based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairman and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes. The c ...
as a "whirlwind of a manager." Carlisle Plastics was voted one of Walmart's "Vendors of the Year". During his tenure, the firm opened facilities in the United States, Europe, Latin America and Asia.
In September 1996, he sold his controlling interest to
Tyco International
Tyco International was a security systems company incorporated in the Republic of Ireland, with operational headquarters in Princeton, New Jersey, United States (Tyco International (US) Inc.). Tyco International was composed of two major busin ...
.
Binnie is currently the president of
Carlisle Capital Corporation
Carlisle ( , ; from ) is a city in the Cumberland district of Cumbria, England.
Carlisle's early history is marked by the establishment of a settlement called Luguvalium to serve forts along Hadrian's Wall in Roman Britain. Due to its proxim ...
, a New Hampshire investment and venture capital company.
"Current estimates show this company has an annual revenue of $2.5 to 5 million and employs a staff of approximately 5 to 9," according to the tracking site Manta.com in 2009.
He currently owns the Wentworth By The Sea Country Club in Rye, once part of the
Wentworth by the Sea Hotel in
New Castle.
In 2010, he formed New Hampshire 1 Network and, in 2011, he founded Carlisle One Media, acquiring television station
WZMY for $9.25 million and renaming it
WBIN. By late 2011, he had tripled the number of employees at the station, recruiting from
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...
,
ESPN
ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...
, and local competitor
WMUR
WMUR-TV (channel 9) is a television station licensed to Manchester, New Hampshire, United States, serving as the ABC affiliate to most of New Hampshire. Owned by Hearst Television, the station maintains studios on South Commercial Street in do ...
. Also purchased were Vermont television stations
WVBK and WVBQ and Nashua station
WYCN.
Binnie has partnered with Jeff Shapiro in a bid for
Nassau Broadcasting
Nassau Broadcasting Partners LP was a company based in Princeton, New Jersey that owned radio stations in New England and the Mid-Atlantic United States. Nassau's stations, which included both AM and FM frequencies, were located in Maryland, New J ...
's radio stations in Northern New England, subject to bankruptcy judge and FCC approval.
In 2017, WBIN-TV announced that it had sold its television broadcast rights for $68.1 million. WBIN-TV also entered into a channel-sharing sale of its remaining television license rights with a major television group. While the final sale figures were undisclosed, it is estimated that in total the station sold for nearly $100 million, nearly $90 million more than the $9.25 million originally paid by Binnie.
Binnie is additionally involved in the revitalization of historic downtown Manchester buildings including the former Citizen's Bank Building on Elm Street and three buildings in Manchester's mill yard.
Racing career
A lifetime driver and mechanic, Binnie drove for Lotus before forming Binnie Motorsports. He was a two-time class winner of the
24 Hours of Le Mans
The 24 Hours of Le Mans () is an endurance-focused Sports car racing, sports car race held annually near the city of Le Mans, France. It is widely considered to be one of the world's most prestigious races, and is one of the races—along with ...
, twice as a driver and once as a team owner.
He won the ALMS Petite Le Mans Road Atlanta in Georgia, as well as the 12 hours of Sebring.
In 2012 he drove for James Watt Automotive's JWA-Avila team.
24 Hours of Le Mans results
Philanthropy
Binnie's extensive charity work in New Hampshire includes donations to expand the "End 68 Hours of Hunger" program into Nashua, New Hampshire. "End 68 Hours of Hunger" helps fight food-insecurity for children that rely on school breakfasts and lunch by providing them meals over the weekend as well.
In May 2015, Binnie won an award from the New Hampshire Preservation Alliance for his "rehabilitation and adaptive use" of the historic Walker School Building in Concord, New Hampshire, the site of the ratification of the U.S. Constitution. Which "created a broadcast center for the state capital."
In 2017, Binnie offered to pay the college tuition for a fifth-grader who told him that she did not plan to attend college. After donating $20,000 for technology upgrades at Smyth Road School in Manchester, New Hampshire, Binnie visited the fifth-grade class and asked all the students to raise their hands if they planned to attend college. When only one student did not raise her hand, Binnie pledged to do whatever he could to get the girl to college, including paying her tuition. Binnie said of the girl, "I think she reminded me of me, a little 10-year-old ... who didn't have many expectations of going to college, I hope the best for that little girl. More important, I want her to be ambitious."
Additionally, the Smyth Road Elementary School library was renamed the Bill Binnie Media Center.
Although a moderate Republican, Binnie and his wife have made political contributions to a variety of political causes and candidates. During his time as Chairman of the Finance Committee for the New Hampshire Republican State Committee,
Binnie contributed tens of thousands of dollars to the state party. However, the frequency of his donations to Democratic candidates in the past drew criticisms from conservative groups during his candidacy in the 2010 Republican primary for the U.S. Senate.
Candidacy for United States Senate
Binnie ran for the
Republican nomination in the
United States Senate election in New Hampshire, 2010. The primary was held on September 14, 2010. Binnie ran for the Republican nomination against
Hollis businessman Jim Bender, former State Board of Education chair
Ovide Lamontagne
Ovide Marc Lamontagne (born 1957) is an American businessman who serves as a shareholder at Bernstein Shur law firm in Manchester, New Hampshire. Lamontagne is a lawyer and a Republican former political candidate who was his party's nominee for ...
, and former state Attorney General
Kelly Ayotte
Kelly Ann Ayotte ( ; born June 27, 1968) is an American attorney and politician serving since 2025 as the 83rd governor of New Hampshire. A member of the Republican Party, she served from 2011 to 2017 as a United States senator from New Hampsh ...
, who won the primary contest and went on to win the election.
Binnie had announced his candidacy in November 2009,
stating that his political beliefs were modeled after the former president
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...
's vision of a limited government that fostered economic growth.
Individuals working on his campaign included Republican consultant
Arthur J. Finkelstein
Arthur Jay Finkelstein (May 18, 1945 – August 18, 2017) was a New York state-based Republican Party (GOP) consultant who worked for conservative and right-wing candidates in the United States, Canada, Israel, Central Europe, and Eastern Europe ...
, based in New York, former NHGOP executive director Paul Collins, and Sheri M. Keniston, formerly a congressional staffer for
John E. Sununu.
During the campaign, Binnie faced criticism from multiple news organizations and opponents for closing A&E Plastics in Santa Ana, California, laying off 450 American workers and then transferring production seven miles away in Tijuana, Mexico.
During the 2010 Senate run Binnie claimed his
pro-choice
Abortion-rights movements, also self-styled as pro-choice movements, are movements that advocate for legal access to induced abortion services, including elective abortion. They seek to represent and support women who wish to terminate their ...
view on abortion attracted death threats from
radical anti-abortion terrorists
Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...
, both against Binnie himself and against his elderly father of the same name, but local police said they were not investigating any death threats, according to the Concord Monitor. Other acts against Binnie and his family included vandalism of his daughter's car, which she blamed on a police officer, and threatening and harassing phone calls and postal mail.
In December 2021, Binnie confirmed that he is "actively considering running for U.S. Senate" again.
References
External links
Binnie on WMUR's Close UpBinnie speaking at an eventsponsored by STEWARD, Save The Economy Without Accumulating Record Debt, a political advocacy group organized by NH businessman Fred Tausch
Entries mentioning William H. Binnieat the
Sunlight Foundation
The Sunlight Foundation was an American 501(c)(3) nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that advocated for open government. The organization was founded in April 2006 with the goal of increasing transparency and accountability in the United States ...
web site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Binnie, William Harrison
1958 births
21st-century American businesspeople
21st-century American philanthropists
American industrialists
American investment bankers
Businesspeople from New Hampshire
European Le Mans Series drivers
FIA World Endurance Championship drivers
Harvard Business School alumni
Living people
New Hampshire Republicans
People from Rockingham County, New Hampshire
Scottish emigrants to the United States
Harvard College alumni