Grilling Wood Business Moves to Waldoboro

Moving from Hope about six weeks ago, a relatively new business called Flame Grilling Products has set up shop on Winslow’s Mills Road in Waldoboro.


Ken and Pam Theobald got into the grilling wood business about 12 years ago, when they started Maine Grilling Woods on their farm in Brooks.


The couple sold that business in 2008, but got back into the industry last fall when they started Flame Grilling Products.


The company sells wood chips, chunks, and rectangular and oval (which the Theobalds say they invented as a result of a customer’s inquiry) grilling planks.


The chips and chunks are burned for smoke – either in a smoker, or on the grill in a couple of ways – but the planks are supposed to be soaked in liquid, such as water, wine, beer or whiskey, before the entrée is cooked on them, Pam said. The wood’s sap, along with those liquids, flavor the food, Pam said.


Right now, the company offers
its various products in 10 different types of wood sourced from Maine: cedar, apple, cherry, ash, beech, rock maple, hornbeam, oak, northern mesquite (locust), and yellow birch.


The difference the products make on food, for the Theobalds at least, is significant.
“We can’t go out and eat at a steakhouse; something’s missing from the smoke,” Pam said.


Ken described the grilling products’ effects on food as a “reward factor.”
“People notice the difference in the flavor,” he said. “It’s not a subtle difference in the flavor.”


Much of the company’s business in grilling planks is in northern white cedar, which has “a very distinctive cedar taste, as compared to the western red cedar,” Ken said.


In and around their 30,000-square-foot building – which also serves as the couple’s home – band-saws, a wood chipper, and a variety of other equipment are run by the Theobalds and their six employees to process, dry, and package their products.


The Theobalds have quite a goal in mind for their business: $10 million in annual sales at the end of five years, which would represent about 10 percent of grilling wood sales in the United States, according to Ken.


“If we reach our goal, that’s a sizable contribution to the economy of Maine,” he said.

Bags of Flame Grilling Products smoking chips sit in the shipping area of the company’s new Waldoboro location. (D. Lobkowicz photo)

About 15 percent of the company’s gross sales is paid out to local woodcutters and, as the business grows, the Theobalds plan to add about seven new employees for every $1 million in sales.


Most of Flame Grilling Products’ business comes in via the internet, Ken said, and the company’s two primary markets are restaurants and food service companies and barbecue suppliers and hardware stores that sell the chips and chunks as accessories to their grills.

They will also sell to customers who stop by their facility.
The building is large enough that the Theobalds are considering adding a retail showroom, possibly as early as next summer.


Starting this fall, Flame Grilling Products will add new types of wood from Florida to its lineup, including wood from citrus, pear, pecan, peach, and walnut trees, Ken said.


The company will probably import its Florida-sourced wood for processing in Maine to start with, and will later process the wood right there in Florida, he said.


“We use every part of the tree, except the leaves,” Ken said.


To that end, the Theobalds are planning to purchase a wood pellet-making machine, both for supplemental heating at their facility and to sell pellets to the barbecue market, he said.
“We don’t have the time to explore all of the avenues that are available to us to be creative in this business,” Pam said.
“But we will, one day,” Ken said.
For more information, visit www.flamegrillingproducts.com or call 790-8259. Flame Grilling Products is located at 2500 Winslow’s Mills Rd. in Waldoboro.
For information about selling wood to Flame Grilling Products, call Production Manager Lisa Dunn at 323-1272.