Kitchenware Retailers
Relish Kitchen Store Brings Home To Downtown Sheboygan
By Greg Gonzales
Just a stone’s throw from Lake Michigan, in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, a mother-daughter duo runs Relish Kitchen Store, a destination for every home cook from Milwaukee to Green Bay. Relish has gained a reputation as a place for home cooks to come and play, and a place to find kitchenware that can last generations.
The pair, Jane Davis-Wood and Sara Woosencraft, were looking to go into business for themselves rather than work under anyone else and created their dream jobs in 2013. “Both my mom and I were in a place where we wanted to do our own thing and be our own boss,” Woosencraft said. “We had both worked in retail our entire careers ― my mom was a store manager for department stores and big box stores, and I worked in corporate retail my entire career ― and we did it! We thought hard on what products we’re interested in, what industry has a good trajectory, and housewares and kitchenwares spoke to us. It’s something we both really love; we both love to cook, we both love kitchen gadgets, so we opened the business.”
Walking into the store, on the main drag in downtown Sheboygan, local shoppers and visitors to the theater across the street who mosey on by are treated to a make-yourself-at-home experience. A pink flag flying under the tree out front lets everyone know Relish is open for business. In July, flowers and American flags frame the entrance; in December, holiday lights shine from the window display. Each display tells a story, whether it’s about the bridal registry or a cookware launch. And though there’s a second floor that houses the offices of an attorney and an accountant, the store’s ceilings are high, but the product is kept low so each product area gets individual attention. “We walk customers through with different cookware brands, for example, and we have a whole summer pies story set up right now for the bakers ― and we have a path in the store we want customers to follow,” explained Woosencraft. “It stops to see trendier things for the season, then there’s a trip to our gadgets corner ― and all paths lead to the kitchen, to see what’s going on back there. It’s one big loop.”
Bakeware pieces, towels, and fundamental gadgets go in the back; that way, people know where they are and can easily find them, but they also get to see the fresh, new, exciting items. Woosencraft explained that she aims for one theme: the gifted kitchen. One side of the store is more of a gift location, and the other is for fundamental cooking tools. “We are for the home cook,” she said. “For example, our kitchen isn’t commercial; we have a kitchen that you would find in your home. We aren’t looking to train people to be professional chefs ― there are schools for that, technical colleges for that ― what we’re doing is helping the home chef become more confident in their abilities and give them the tools they need both education-wise and tool-wise to be more confident in the kitchen. Every area of our store feels personal and homey, as opposed to feeling industrial.”
Along with its location, Woosencraft attributed some of Relish’s success to her and Davis-Wood’s previous experience. “We’ve been able to translate what we’ve learned from our previous work into building a store that our customers really enjoy,” she said. “We know how to merchandise, we know how to have a conversation with a customer and how to speak their language, to help them figure out what they’re really looking for.”
One of the store’s features that brings the customers in and coming back is the kitchen, which they added in mid-2017 to provide cooking classes, a space for bachelorette parties and bridal showers, corporate team-building events and more. Sometimes teachers come to the kitchen for Relish’s Healthy eating class, which saves teachers money on their insurance premiums. “We always have something going on in the kitchen, whether we’re demonstrating some of our food products ― we sell Stonewall Kitchen and a lot of local items ― so we get something back there and customers in the kitchen to see how cool it is in there, and maybe get them interested in a class,” Woosencraft said. “We’ve set up a gadget bar before, where we put a bunch of cutting boards out with a gadget and say, go on in and play. You’re here shopping, so test out the things we love! We might put a lemon squeezer back there, a cheese knife, the Garlic Twister, any kind of gadget where they can do it themselves.” On top of that, just about any item in the store is available to try out right there in the kitchen. “We try to make sure if a customer is interested in an item that we have the ability and opportunity to have them play with it, to engage with, touch and feel it to try it out. One of the favorite gadgets in the store is the Garlic Twister, a small hand tool for mincing garlic or ginger, and customers are curious about it; they want to know if the buzz is real or if it’s just something we’re trying to sell them. So we take them back into the kitchen, give them a clove of garlic and let them try it out. More often than not, what they try is what they’re looking for. So it’s kind of awesome to see someone on the fence thinking about something and give them the opportunity to actually try it and feel good about their purchase.”
Retailer Honors
The store won the Sheboygan County Retailer of the Year Award from the county’s Chamber of Commerce in February, and for good reason ― Woosencraft says that bigger stores regularly send customers to Relish when they can’t provide what her store offers. “What makes us different from a Bed Bath & Beyond, let’s say, or Walmart, is that we provide a more customized service,” said Woosencraft. “We know our customers; they come and visit us on the regular, we know about their lives, we know what purchases they’ve made before and can have a conversation with them about how those tools are working ― and if something new is coming out, we can give them a heads-up. We can make the experience more personal. There’s a benefit to being a small, independent store.”
Without a big corporate machine behind their marketing, Woosencraft and Davis-Wood stick to networking and local advertising to get the word out. “ We have a pretty active social media presence where we work hard to engage with our customers and make sure we’re having a conversation with them, and that they hear back from us if they send a question,” Woosencraft said. “We also work closely with our Chamber of Commerce to make sure that tourists and visitors, and new folks in town, are able to come in. We’ve worked with our local realtors to capture new folks to town, and some of our real estate agents in town work with us to provide their welcome gifts, like custom cutting boards and wine glasses, or whatever they want to give to their new clients.”
Customers choose Relish over the bigger stores when they want a quality product, rather than something that’ll have to be replaced in a couple years. Because of that, Woosencraft explained, the store gets very few returns ― which surprises her and Davis-Wood, “because we come from bigger retailers, where returns are the name of the game and expected. If you want a $14.99 pan, you can get that from Walmart here in town, but that’s not what you’re going to find at Relish. At Relish, you’re going to find a pan that might be a little bit of an investment, a little more than you’re used to spending, but it’s something that can last your entire life. You can pass it on to your kids because you took care of it because you used the right tools because we helped you learn what to do to make it last.”
KitchenAid Tools and Gadgets Relaunched
KitchenAid tools and gadgets received a major makeover for 2018 with designs that debuted at this year’s International Home +
Housewares Show. The new collections, under license by Lifetime Brands, address current design trends and the desires of the evolving home chef. “The updated KitchenAid tools and gadgets feature slimmer designs, smaller, user-friendly handles and finishes, natural materials, and quieter branding, which reflects trends that we’ve seen within the home,” says Steve Campise, Kitchenware Division President, Lifetime Brands, Inc. “Each of the new ranges, regardless of material, were developed to represent the quality and craftsmanship that the KitchenAid consumer expects.”
The relaunch consists of a complete update to the KitchenAid Classic and Gourmet collections. The new designs are sleek and clean and feature a subtle logo to allow the products’ features, functions, and craftsmanship to stand out. The KitchenAid Classic assortment features an updated handle design with a gloss ABS accent, satin chrome finish accents, and debossed KitchenAid logo. The KitchenAid Gourmet line features trend-right matte finishes and upgraded, brushed stainless steel accents on the handles. This range will also include the KitchenAid 1919 medallion logo on the endcap. In addition to the new handled tools and gadgets, the KitchenAid line includes items such as fruit slicers, pastry blenders, bowl scrapers, odor-removing bars, etched graters, splatter screens, tongs, and measuring cups and spoons, as well as a new set of textured ceramic mixing bowls.
To further provide customers with premium KitchenAid product offerings, Lifetime Brands also introduced KitchenAid tools and gadgets with wood handles at this year’s International Home + Housewares Show. Natural woods, including walnut, acacia, maple, and beech wood, will be combined with satin, copper, or other metal accent finishes. The wood handles add a sophisticated, upscale look to the KitchenAid portfolio. These tools will be available in 2019.
The 2018 tool and gadget introductions are also aligned with global KitchenAid color strategy. Many kitchen tools and gadgets will now be offered in the KitchenAid colors of milkshake, pistachio, and ink blue.
Making the Most of Your Social Media Accounts
By Greg Gonzales
Facebook and Instagram, among other platforms, are great places to connect directly with your customers. Letting your personality shine through in your posts is a great way to attract them and keep them coming back. A mix of storytelling and original content that your customers can connect with puts your store ahead of the retail giants, and shows the online community that your store is a destination with a personal touch. Use your voice to build connections, and your page will reach more people, which will translate into more foot traffic.
When getting started with a new Facebook page, or when revamping it, the experts recommend writing a description in the about section that describes the store well and makes it searchable on sites like Google. “For Instagram, it’s going to be kind of short, but with Facebook, you want to make your about section really long, to fit a lot of keywords and tell your story,” said Social Media Coach Andrea Vahl. “You want to talk about what makes your business unique, why they should come to your store and not another store. You can also include links to your other sites, your Twitter, so people can find you easily on multiple social sites. Copy and paste some sort of testimonial in there from a customer, too. But with Instagram, your space is short; you really have to craft your bio, and there I would really focus on what makes your store unique.” Vahl also suggests that retailers get to know which platforms their audience uses, to make sure owners aren’t spreading themselves thin. “It’s hard to do it all,” she said. “Don’t try to do it all, because it’s going to end up with you dropping the ball here and there.”
After getting on the right platforms, learning to craft a post that’s more than a mere ad is important. “Don’t think about features and benefits [when posting about a new product], think about use occasions and moments you can create, that you can envision in your own life for that product,” said Laura Davis-Taylor, Co-Founder of High Street Collective, a retail experience design company. “If it looks like an ad, you’re out ― no one’s going to look at you, no one’s going to participate. Let’s say I have this super-amazing, inexpensive nonstick pan. What you’ll want to do is post, ‘Look at this amazing nonstick pan, it’s got five stars and I can tell you right now it’s going to be the best lifetime value you’ve ever seen!’ Don’t do that. Instead, you should post something like, ‘Mamma Leone has been using this for 15 years and not once has she seen it leave a scrap. Try it for yourself, and here’s a chicken cacciatore recipe,’ and have a picture of her with her favorite quote. You’re still getting that feature and benefit across, but not in a check-the-box way. It’s an emotional appeal.” She also including videos and images with other posts has emotional appeal as well, because images give you a chance to communicate your store’s style. Vahl added that personal posts, about what’s going on in the store, can also be effective. “With authenticity comes human nature, a human touch, so maybe even talk about things that aren’t going well. Obviously you don’t want to say your sales are down, but say maybe, ‘It’s Monday, we’re kind of tired today,’” she said. “If people see what’s going on with you, they see you’re a real human, so add a few things that are a tad more personal, the good and a little bit of the bad.”
For Ben Salmon, Owner of Kitchen A La Mode, a specialty kitchenware store in South Orange, New Jersey, that means letting his personality shine in his posts. “What do I have that no other store has? I can get creative with my product, but there’s limited product out there, there’s limited fixtures, staff ― there are limitations to whatever you do, and most people could basically do what I do. What I have that no one else does is me,” said Salmon. “So I really try to bring me and my voice, to give Kitchen A La Mode it’s own unique voice, and really be a member of the community.”
That also requires paying attention to social media and responding quickly to comments. “Responding to comments is absolutely critical,” said Davis-Taylor. “People expect you to be there, expect you to answer, expect to communicate like they’re standing right there ― and if you don’t, you’re seen as disingenuous very quickly, and you miss so many important opportunities. Don’t do social media if you can’t respond – it’s a two-way channel. Users see this as a way of having a relationship with you. They’re giving you a nod to be inside their inner circle, or in some cases they’re calling you out for not being a good person. Even though you’re a store, they still see your page as a human thing. Think about when you’ve been on AirBnB – you find a great house that looks fantastic, and somebody completely crushes it in a comment. When the owner responds and says, ‘I see, Carol. I’m really sorry that happened — here’s the situation,’ very quickly, you think that this is a very caring owner, and that the commenter was just a hothead. You have to show there’s a human behind there ― people will forgive things, they just want to be heard.”
Salmon also finds this aspect of social media to be critical. “Talking with, not to, is really important. People with pages online are kind of afraid of personality, and they try to go very neutral, appeal to everyone. But when you try to appeal to everyone you appeal to no one,” Salmon said. “They go very corporate, very blah, with a business voice. I don’t think that works. You have to talk with people, you have to be there with them online as one of their friends and a member of their online community.”
Another way to advertise more than products on your accounts is to post about events ― like tastings and classes ― which also serves as a way to gauge the effectiveness of your efforts online. Davis-Taylor said retail can participate in what she calls “meetup culture,” where people are more often seeking out ways to connect with other people offline. “Our theory at the collective is that as more of our lives become automated, we lose the emotions that come along with having done these things with each other in places that are rich with feelings and people and moments, so we’re seeking them out,” said Davis-Taylor. “Give everyone a delightful reason to come to the store! Tie it to a product. If it’s not a hard sell, you’re going to drive traffic and drive sales from it, but you have to be creative about it, you gotta know your shoppers and your target audience, you have to make it appealing ― don’t do it on a Wednesday night if most of your audience is families, do it on a Saturday afternoon ― you see what I’m saying? Or if it’s young singles, make sure it’s on a Wednesday night and do it at 8 and make sure to bring in some really good sushi.”
And according to Vahl, this kind of content can help you measure your success online. She says to try posting an event on your page, or a web-exclusive coupon, and see how many people respond online and with foot traffic. “You really want to make sure you’re understanding your objectives [getting people in the door], so watch the stats to make sure you’re improving or not,” she said. “Try to create opportunities to see if you’re getting more foot traffic. It lets you see if your social media work is making a difference.”
If your page is struggling to get a response, whether in the store or online, targeted ads, a little attention, research or delegating the task to staff can help. “Making sure you’re occasionally doing targeted ads can really make sure you’re improving visibility,” Vahl said, adding that targeted ZIP codes and demographics (like if you’re trying to reach mothers, or an older audience) is a great way to reach that crowd and track the effectiveness of your advertising. “Online, you can measure specifically to see how many people clicked on your ad, or took the action you wanted them to take [like sharing or liking the post].” Davis-Taylor recommended making social media part of the store’s workflow. “Dedicate time out of the week to learn, or dedicate someone on staff to do social media as part of their job,” she said. “It’s about being mindful. If you’re a mom-and-pop, you’ve got a phone in your pocket; you get a new item that comes in, you see a beautiful moment with your gorgeous new item in the morning light, take a picture, post it. There’s also a lot to say about things that feel exclusive; exclusive artists, exclusive numbers of products, that’s a big way to get some attention traffic. Tell the story of your local artisans, of what you did to find the product.” She also recommended bringing on the younger crowd to help out. “The young kids get it. They live in this medium,” she said. “If you can find a young person out of college, get them to spend some time in your store, educate them on your shop and who you are, educate them on the kind of experience you want, make sure they’re passionate about your products and get them to do their thing on behalf of you ― they know what to do.”
If you can’t afford to hire anyone, she said, either consult your own kids or your younger customers, or “if you have some young people on the floor, do a contest ― 50 bucks for the best social media or event idea this month. Do it! They’re smart. We forget this because we don’t usually nod to the younger generation and say, ‘Hey, make me smarter.’ We have this old bias that we’re the ones who are supposed to be teaching them stuff, and it’s not like that anymore.” She added that the young crowd knows what’s happening next, so tapping into their knowledge is how your social media campaign will be ready for the next big thing. “The rich, low-hanging fruit on social media is getting in on something before it becomes mainstream, because that’s how you’re going to get a bunch of new fans,” she said. “Do something novel before it goes viral!”
Kitchen A La Mode: Small Store With Huge Personality
By Greg Gonzales
There’s a store in South Orange where customers who see boxes stacked on the brick sidewalk outside take that as their cue to rush to the counter inside. Nestled snugly between two restaurants in downtown South Orange, New Jersey, Kitchen A La Mode’s owner, Ben Salmon, has figured out how to make his store into a fantasy land for shoppers who need a totally unique gift or home cooks who want tools and décor they can’t find anywhere else.
The store is located just four doors down from one of the busiest train stations in New Jersey, along a line that runs right to Manhattan’s Penn Station in a 30-minute ride that brings 4,000 commuters a day from the heart of New York City to Kitchen A La Mode’s doorstep and display window. Salmon has made that window more than just a display; it’s part of his sales floor. “I’m still toying around with this idea of an interactive window, so I actually have a table in it you can shop from,” he said. “People kind of like this idea of being able to shop in the window, so right now, while I try to make it pleasing from the outside, it’s also interactive from the inside.”
In addition to product-oriented displays, he’s also tried pop-up shops. “We had someone come in who does mini herb and succulent gardens; she set up all her stuff in the window, and it was this kind of live shopping window, which was new for us. It got a lot of interest,” he said. He also breaks out the sharpening machine to do live sharpening events, right there in the window, and people line up with battered knives in hand before opening just to see him do it, and Salmon added that it’s a great way to remind customers that they can come in to get a knife sharpened anytime.
Once they’re lured inside, customers find a 1,000 square-foot shop with the good-better-best inventory one might expect in a much larger space. “I’ve always called the store a Manhattan-style boutique with a village-neighborly charm,” Salmon said. “It has a European feel to it, very narrow and long with a second-floor loft. We pack a lot of punch; we probably have the inventory of a 2,500 square-foot store in 1,000 square feet. We have very, very high ceilings, which kind of makes the whole space feel very open, and our product pretty much goes up to the ceiling. You have to be very meticulous as a merchandiser and a curator in that situation; I have a kind of architectural style of merchandising to keep it neat and organized because it could very easily turn into a junk shop, but it’s not; it just looks like we have a lot of great stuff.”
“I’m big into consumer psychology, and I don’t want people to feel like they can’t touch something,” he continued. “If something is too sweet in a story, if a story is kind of complex and it looks just the way it would in their kitchen, people might not want to mess up the display. I merchandise in a way that encourages people to touch the product, to interact with the product, I want them to touch it and feel like they can look at the price.”
The first third of the store changes frequently, along with the window; it’s more gift-centric and focused on new product as it comes in. “All the new product, I introduce in the front of the store, and as new product comes in, slightly older products move to another category somewhere else in the store,” Salmon said. “So what I focus on is more of the impulse, gifty purchases up front, and then people are going to come up and ask for a baking sheet or a can opener, and that stuff is further back in the store, so they go past the giftier, interesting stuff before they get to the essentials.”
Local items aren’t Salmon’s biggest sellers, but he’s still always searching for them, because they help him compete with online giants. “In many ways, I’m working with folks who are just starting with wholesale business,” said Salmon. One of those people is Lisa Lofdahl, of LL Metal Works, whose knives are all made from scratch, one of a kind, never working off molds. Beloved Bath, a bath products maker owned by two women whose young-adult sons are on the autism spectrum, uses its proceeds to fund job training for young adults with autism. “We don’t have what everyone else has, so people really do like to come in to see what’s new and different,” Salmon said. “And our local artisans give me an opportunity to consistently rotate through that.”
He also sources products from around the world: a South Orange local hooked him up with an artisan maker in a small town in Venezuela who makes hammocks and placemats, along with wood products like spoons, bowls, pestles and mortars and bowls, all of which he displayed in his window earlier this year.
For Kitchen A La Mode, gifts are really the lifeblood of the operation, which is part of what kept the store alive since its beginning ― two months before the 2008 financial crisis. “I’m moving further and deeper into the gift category. People are always willing to spend money on others, and my problem with my essentials is that when you sell high-quality, high-value product, people only need to buy it once,” Salmon said.
“In order to keep things going, I’m amping up my gifts ― I’ll always have my essentials, but what I’ve always found when I go online, whether it’s Amazon or etsy or whatever, if you know what you’re looking for, you can be pretty successful and get what you want. And in fact, that’s where I’m always going to lose to Amazon, is that people know that they want a 12-inch All-Clad skillet. Why do they need me? They don’t. They know exactly what they want, they go online, they type it into Amazon and have it delivered the next day. So I’ve acknowledged that I’ve kind of lost that business, so the business I haven’t lost is the people who don’t know what they want.”
“If you don’t know what you want, it can be extremely difficult to find the right thing online, whereas if you come into our store, you have help, and you can just wander around and look,” he added. “You can see something new; you never even thought to give your friend a Moscow mule mug and a cocktail shaker, but you see it and it’s perfect, and you never would have discovered that online. For inspiration and education, brick and mortar will always be relevant. Also, one-of-a-kind product, the local stuff I’m the exclusive retailer for, things that are made in smaller batches that couldn’t sell on Amazon or in chain stores where each individual product varies as you get it, those kinds of things are going to do better in physical retail. That’s where we have to mark our territory.”
Grilling The Expert at All Things Barbecue
by Micah Cheek
All Things Barbecue in Wichita, Kansas, realized that the best advertising for outdoor cookware happens in the backyard, when neighbors get together in the backyard and say, “How the heck did you cook these ribs?” That’s why All Things Barbecue has focused on consumer education and turning customers into their marketing team.
When All Things Barbecue was founded in 2009, it was a rough time for many businesses, but it was becoming a great time for outdoor cooking. “People who have had decades in this business talk about how barbecue tends to improve as economies get tight. If people aren’t going out, they’re hanging out at home more,” says Don Cary, All Things Barbecue’s President. “It’s just a matter of fact: As the economy gets tight, these businesses tend to do equal or better.” Barbecuing and grilling have become part of the routine for consumers who have less money to travel or entertain, but still want to do something special. “This isn’t new, but they call it a staycation. You still have your time off, but instead of heading off to the lake or the mountains, you’re simply spending dollars in your backyard.”
When consumers can make great food with a grill or smoker, everyone who enjoys it becomes a potential customer. “The thing of it is, we’ve become known. We have many thousands of units in our home town,” says Cary. “There are people who buy one of our cookers, and then a neighbor gets one.” The key to making sure new grill and smoker owners can show off their skills is education, including information on hand to anyone walking through the store. “A lot of times people have experienced what a cooker can do for them, and then they come in with a leg up on that. And then it’s a process of education,” says Cary. “This video plays on a 50- inch TV above our products, I find that to be important. People sometimes aren’t educated enough to ask good questions, so the video helps them out.”
All Things Barbecue has also fed this community of cooks a stream of recipes and content by developing a web presence with YouTube. “We have a YouTube channel that we’ve built that has really done a good job,” says Cary. “We started doing this YouTube thing just a couple of years ago. As it began to get shape and traction, then we started doing more in it.” The channel grew into tutorial videos on many types of grills and smokers, product reviews and recipes. All Things Barbecue now has over 100,000 followers. “This past weekend, after a class was over, a couple said, ‘We flew here from San Francisco for the weekend.’ They had found our channel, gotten into it, ordered this pellet cooker and cooked on it, and made the trip out,” adds Cary. “In November, we had seven states represented outside our own … It is a destination.”
All Things Barbecue keeps the conversation going in the store with classes that keep people going back to their patio. Cary has dedicated a section of the store to cooking classes, with a prep and dining area inside, and grills or smokers outdoors. “It’s a higher-end appeal. We have a large gas-fired stove top, double-door oven, hoods above that, it looks like a combination of home and warehouse,” says Cary. “Then you can walk onto our patio that has a dozen grills on it. We don’t have that problem with smoke clearing out like you might think.” The classes bring in a wide range of students, some of whom are just looking for a fun date night with Friday night grilling and wine pairings, and some of whom are veteran barbecuers building their expertise.
“If I had to average a weekend, it’s half new and half repeat [customers]. It depends on the class. It keeps us on our toes creating new class content, new items and new methods,” Cary adds. That new content comes from many different corners of Wichita and beyond, giving students an opportunity to try global flavors and try out some unusual cuts. “Believe me, we reach into every nook and cranny. We had a friend of ours and a local sushi chef here build a beef negimaki recipe,” says Cary. “In beef, the brisket is the ultimate, but we do strips, standing rib roasts, and teres major, also known as a petite tender. Tri-tips, flanks and hangars are super popular. We do fish well. We did an event where we had an eight-pound piece of ahi tuna that we seared fast and served [almost] raw. There’s nothing we haven’t tackled here.”
High-end barbecuing equipment caters to a very specific clientele: Middle-income families who are making improvements to their homes and backyards while trying to become more competent cooks. “Starting in the mid-30s, incomes are middle and up. And that’s where our sales come from. Everybody shows up, but the people who have helped us to gain traction and grow are [ages] 35-65 and couples,” says Cary. “They’re making an investment, they’re spending time together, so it’s common that they come and shop together.” The reason All Things Barbecue has all these different education resources is to make improving cooking skills easy and trying new things as simple as possible. “The average person is coming in wanting to cook a better meal,” says Cary. “People are learning, they ask questions about why [their] chicken’s dry, they start getting education on cooking to temperature, brining, seasoning, the whole thing. People begin to get interested in improving their cooking in general.”
All Things Barbecue offers more traditional gas grills, but as consumers see the exciting outdoor options like smokers and pizza ovens, they really get into different heat and smoke sources. “I think gas grills are considered to be quick and simple; they’re not afraid of them. If consumers aren’t familiar with the grill, they don’t know what is required of it and what to do, and I understand that,” says Cary. “We have people with higher cooking IQs that show up in our store. They’ve been building up their interest, so it’s easy for them to come in.” Pellet fired cookers, offset heat smokers that feed wood pellets into a heating element automatically, are tools that give home cooks a laser-like degree of control over temperature and time. These are the appliances that make brisket for the family easy, and will take care of ribs while the cook steps away to host the party.
When cooks get the knowledge of how to best use these appliances, an obsession often develops. “You’re more and more likely to know someone cooking on one,” says Cary. “Pellet is the fastest growing of the smaller categories [of heat sources]. Charcoal has been number two, and there are certain aspects of that that are being challenged by pellet grills. It’s down a few percent since a few years ago. I think [customers] are interested in better-tasting food, and I think the visibility of the pellet grill has really come on in the last five years.”
Pellet cookers are also pulling double or triple duty as smokers, grills and ovens, giving their owners one machine that does it all. “On the other hand, once they get that, next thing you know, they’re coming in and buying another grill for another cooking style,” adds Cary. “A good grill that’s versatile and you don’t have to fight- that’s what you’re after. After that they’re comfortable and they can make things they couldn’t imagine.”
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