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The best article in the world of outdoor cooking that I read this week doesn’t even come from my own site. Billy Prim was inducted into the LP Gas Hall of Fame, and LP Gas Magazine wrote an article about his story. He founded Blue Rhino Corp, which grew to be the largest propane cylinder exchange in the U.S.
I love a good entrepreneur journey, and his was great. Propane exchanges were key to the popularization of gas grills, and he revolutionized that industry.
A large retailer in outdoor cooking, that has big growth plans, is Academy Sports. They announced this week that their Chairman, President and CEO, Ken Hicks, will be leaving his role. In a planned succession, their current Chief Merchandising Officer will take over as CEO, with the President title going to their CFO.
I feel like a broken record saying this, but Vista Outdoor announced another departure. The Camp Chef parent is losing a board member. Frances Philip gave notice that she won’t seek re-election this year. That’s the second board departure in as many months.
Camp Chef broadened their fuel offerings this week with two new products. They came out with wood chunks and wood chips in a variety of wood species. The virgin hardwood comes from Missouri and Arkansas, we’re guessing from the Fiber Energy Products facilities they acquired. The smoking wood is a good compliment to their Woodwind Pro and new XXL Pro smokers.
Nexgrill has partnered with Jealous Devil on their $50k BBQ Competition. The details haven’t been released yet, but an Oakford offset will sweeten the pot. The competition has a People’s Choice tie-in on social media, along with the SCA and KCBS points based competition.
Solo Stove has begun doing individual custom etching on their fire pits. Up to this point they just did custom etching on large corporate orders. Now you can add two lines of text to your fire pit at check-out.
Finally, we did a review of the Monument Grills Denali 425 this week. It’s a reasonably priced gas grill with a good feature set, including smart features.