Welcome to the Breeo Archives series! The last 10 years of smokeless fire has taken us on quite the journey as we've strived to develop and build the best fire pit in the world. Join us in celebrating the history of Breeo as we walk you through the highs and lows of the last decade, with stories told by co-founder Jonathan Miller.
At Breeo, one of our core values as a company is continuous improvement. This looks like learning from past products and making sure that our current products are the best on the market and the most innovative. One product that we learned and improved from was the Ablaze, which was the first Breeo fire pit. We took some time out of co-founder Jonathan Miller’s day to ask him some questions about the Ablaze and what Breeo learned from it.
Here’s what he had to say:
“The Ablaze was the iteration of the Camp King Fire Pit which was the first ever smokeless fire fit, made in Ohio in 2011. The Camp King was a fire pit that was roughly 24 inches inside and was made of carbon steel, painted with a high temp outdoor grill paint and had some grilling accessories. When Breeo started, it was our first product and so that was the product that we took to the market in the spring 2014 to the HPBA Expo where the Ablaze Fire Pit won the best in show award for Most Innovative Product.”
Jonathan also shared how the Ablaze was a great fire pit and featured as 1 of 4 lines in the Breeo Collections lineup from 2014 to 2019. It established Breeo’s reputation of manufacturing high performing smokeless fire pits however, there were some design flaws that eventually led to a discontinuation of the product. The Ablaze was a carbon steel fire pit that was coated with a black high temp paint. In the long-term, however, no coating can totally prevent the wear effects of 2,000 degree fires, and inevitably, the visual appeal of the Ablaze would decline as it aged and surface rust accumulated on the fire pit where the paint was compromised.
With a heavy duty fire pit that lacked portability and a less than ideal material, the innovative minds of the Breeo Team came together to design a new model that increased portability and would last a lifetime in the elements and age with beauty.
Jon stated, “The number one thing we learned (from the Ablaze) is not to coat our fire pits. So we made products that were either made with Corten Steel or 304 Stainless Steel, products that were naturally corrosion resistant, and that would stand up to temperatures and elements for long periods of time.”
The value of continuous improvement led to the discontinuation of the Ablaze and the release of redesigned fire pits that would last longer, look better, and age beautifully.
Jonathan shared that “As we develop products, we test them internally and then once we love them, we put them into the marketplace. Over time as consumers use them and get creative with how they use them, we learn more things about the products and how we can add more features to the product and make them look better and function better. We’re just never satisfied with where our products are at. We have the greatest fire pit in the world but just because it's the greatest in the world doesn't mean we’re done with it.”
Like Jonathan said, we are never done developing our products. As a team at Breeo, we continue finding new ways to improve and develop our products and like always, there’s exciting things in store for Breeo!
