I just found out today.  I think they cancelled all of them, but I don't know for certain.

They will be factory-only sales from now on.  They sent emails to dealers to cancel the relationships and saying they would fill existing orders or cancel them if asked to do so.

I prefer to buy from a local dealer rather than the factory.  A distant dealer is second best.  Buying from the factory is way down my preference list.

I know Rec Tec went that road and I think so did Mak, seems to me if the buck just keeps getting pasted from the dealer to the Manufacture to always fix stuff...I do not blame them.  Why not cut the middle man out and take that profit for yourself!

I know Rec Tec went that road and I think so did Mak, seems to me if the buck just keeps getting pasted from the dealer to the Manufacture to always fix stuff...I do not blame them.  Why not cut the middle man out and take that profit for yourself!

I agree 100%.  A few years ago, when I was researching what pit to buy by reading every post on the former site, I asked a few GMG owners why they were calling the factory for problem resolution rather than their dealers.  I was told to "Shut up!  You don't even own a grill."

I expect other manufacturers to drop their dealers.

I was looking at GMG and was excited to see a dealer about 10 miles away from me, a pool and spa dealer, so off i went bought me a DC. The guy said he just picked up the line about a month ago, I asked him if he had used one and he said not yet. So even  if I had an issue he wouldn't have been able to help anyways. Sometime with in the next year he was out of business. Probably hard to keep dealers in some markets.

I was talking to the owner of a local grill store about Blazn and why he didn't sell them  He said the margins were not there for him after the grill was shipped to Florida. This was over a year ago. 

The big reason for a manufacturer to sell through a dealer network is to simplify the logistical process.  Fewer (larger) shipments to fewer destinations is easier.  It also transfers the inventory burden away from the manufacturer and onto the dealer.

I'm interested to see if they still build to order or if they'll maintain stock on hand.  Nonetheless, I'm sure the vast majority of their sales were factory-direct, so this really means next to nothing.

BUMP!

The dealer that told me that Blaz'n cancelled their dealer relationships last spring, told me that Blaz'n recently the store a registered letter asking them to, again, become a dealer.  He assumes that they sent the letter to all of the dealers they dropped.

He declined to become a Blaz'n dealer.

Doh!

If you go to the Blaz'n web site and click on <Ready To Buy> you won't see any dealers listed.

You will see a photograph of a Blaz'n pit that's backwards.  I tend to lose confidence in companies that can't properly compose a web page.  But that's just me.

They have started back up with dealers again. The grill place I picked mine up at are now carrying them again. Supposedly they stopped cause some dealers were not following their terms for selling them.

I'm no sales expert, but when you walk into one of these patio/outdoor stores, your not going to get much valuable input on the pit anyway, so why bother. They usually have no ability to assist if there is a problem. I read about folks having a Dealer that goes the extra mile with support, but have never seen it here. I hope they do well.

I'm no sales expert, but when you walk into one of these patio/outdoor stores, your not going to get much valuable input on the pit anyway, so why bother. They usually have no ability to assist if there is a problem.

I'd bother because each handling of an end user problem contributes to their education.  They'll have a ready solution the next time someone has that same problem.  Dealers will never acquire adequate product knowledge if pit owners continually bypass them.  That may be the dealers' preferences, but I doubt that it's the corporate preference.

Many manufacturers carefully track the costs associated with corporate post sale servicing.  They recover those costs by including an increment in product prices.  Do you want to keep prices low?  If so, go to your dealer first.

We don't call Detroit if we have problems with our Fords.