After 70 years in business, Parkside Lanes in Aurora still on a roll

Parkside Lanes in Aurora honored a significant milestone over the weekend as the bowling alley at Route 30 and Montgomery Road celebrated its 70th year in business.

Now run by fourth generation general manager and proprietor Kurt Frieders, staff at the bowling venue said discussions about having some kind of anniversary event began “a couple of years ago, obviously, as we knew that 70 years was on the horizon.”

“We knew that we wanted to do quite a bit of remodeling and improvements for that 70th year which we have completed and, of course, we wanted to punctuate it at the end with a big weekend party for our customers,” Frieders said.

One of them was Joey Becker of Aurora, who said he has been coming to Parkside Lanes for more than 20 years.

“I’ve been in summer leagues and I think this has lasted so long because it feels like mom and pop,” Becker said Saturday afternoon. “This doesn’t feel commercialized. You feel at home here. Everyone is very friendly, the staff and everyone.”

The 70th anniversary theme was carried out over the weekend with Parkside Lanes offering hot dogs, soft drinks and lines of bowling all priced at 70 cents.

Dylan Melgosa of Aurora was also on hand for the celebration Saturday and said he has been a customer of Parkside Lanes for over 10 years.

“The first thing that brought me in here — my parents grew up bowling, and they wanted to do a league. The leagues are fun and it’s a great atmosphere. Great people,” he said.

One of the most faithful patrons at the event Saturday was Ramon Rodriguez of Aurora, who said he was 5 years old when his dad starting bowling at the venue and that he himself has been coming for 60 years.

“I still come because of the employees. They’re all superfriendly. I enjoy bowling and it gets me out of the house and is something you can do 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” he said. “My best is a perfect game of 300. I’ve done it 20 or 30 times.”

Frieders said the health of the bowling industry seems to be strong right now.

“Bowling remains very popular. People love to bowl. Several bowling centers have closed, but those that are currently open — at least in our case — seem to be thriving,” he said. “Like any business, I was concerned coming back from COVID, wondering if my customers are going to come back to the level we had before. I can honestly say we are busier now than we have been in our existence. We’re eternally grateful our customers have come back and are enjoying this place more than ever.”

Parkside Lanes operations manager Stephanie Bonczyk said there are more than 800 guests a day coming to the bowling alley and “close to 6,000 visitors a week.”

Frieders said Parkside Lanes has seen its share of changes as the decades have went by.

“The largest improvement, I would say, was when the industry went to automatic scoring. We went to that in 1989 and were the first in the Fox Valley area to go to automatic scoring,” he said. “That’s the biggest. Now, whether it’s good or bad, kids growing up don’t know to keep score with pencil and paper like other people grew up doing. It made things somewhat easier.”

Another change Frieders noted was the advent of bumpers that can be put in place to keep balls from going into the gutter, which he said have helped to foster a new generation of bowlers.

“I’m sure many people have seen them and used them with their children or grandchildren,” he said. “It was a somewhat minor invention. It kept little kids from just throwing gutter after gutter and they could get pins and instead of being discouraged. They could get a strike or a spare and make then want to come back instead of just throwing the ball in the gutter and being sad.”

After 70 years in business, Frieders said he expects Parkside Lanes to continue in business for a long time to come.

“My great-grandfather is the one who founded this place and built it from the ground up in 1956. We take a lot of pride in the fact we have many long-term employees,” he said. “Stephanie (Bonczyk) has been here 49 years and her husband, who has recently passed, was here 53 years. They certainly have the longest tenure but there are people who have been here 20 and 30 years. It’s always been a family-run business and that’s important to us. We’re not a giant corporation.”

David Sharos is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.