I was bored so I looked up average sales of most pellet grill companies. Memphis is skewed due to them being a whollowned subsidiary of Dalsin Industries. I excluded Firecraft since I would not find the data. I included Weber even though they don't currently have a pellet grill just for comparison.

Company Annual Sales in Millions

Weber-Stephen 1636.9
Traeger Pellet Grills LLC 100.447
Memphis (Dalsin Industries) 44.54
Cookshack 9.16
Mak Metals, Inc 6.25
Yoder Smokers 6
Camp Chef (Logan Outdoor Products, LLC) 5.26
GMG Products LLC 3.23
Kuma Stoves, Inc 2.58
Louisiana Grills (Dansons) 1.52
Pitt Boss (Dansons) 1.52
Rec Tec .23
Smokin Brothers .18
Blaz'n Grill Works .13

 My first pellet pit was a Traeger,L'il Tex..As it was new to me I had a learning curve to go thru..In those days (about 6 + years) Traeger had some problems as well. 

 Back then I could phone in and talk to some very helpful and knowledgeable people. A lot I got to know by name..Good old fashioned service.

 My most recent encounters were opposite;People I had never heard of that had text book answers and "programmed" to answer quickly and get on to the next call.

 Years ago I dismantled my fan motor for service and inadvertently reversed the coil resulting in the fan turning backwards. A call to Traeger connected me to Jake who said give me a minute, then came back with the coil is reversed..When asked how did you know,Jake replied we got some motors in that were assembled incorrectly. A totally honest answer from a very nice person.

 Not too long ago someone on Pelletheads had a new fan that was blowing backwards..When he called Traeger they couldn't help other than to suggest an other fan..I helped him with info on how to reverse the coil. That solved the problem.

 It just isn't the same mentality or knowledge anymore..Perhaps my age is showing..Joe Traeger made his money and has moved on.

In the big picture of backyard BBQ, I think wood-pellet grills are still relatively unknown. Yes they have been around for a long time, but there are a ton of people that have no clue what they are. I think our views are skewed because we are on a pellet grill specific forum. I have 10 or so friends that all own Traegers and of them, I am the only one who is on a BBQ specific forum. So I think his numbers may not be as out of line as we think. Andrus's goal is to make Traeger a household name, something akin to Weber. He is a marketing genius. He has aligned himself with BBQ celebrity and is flooding social media with ads and videos. I am listening to the Dan Patrick show on Fox Sports and they talk about their Traeger every day (of course Traeger is a show sponsor).  I don't think their goal is to have a Timberline in every home, but to have a Traeger in every home. They are looking to be a gas grill/charcoal grill replacement. To the lay person who is not a BBQ savant, a digitally controlled grill that gives wood grilled flavor is very intriguing.

 Its been amazing the questions I get from my friends about my Traeger since they started advertising on the DP show specifically. Some of the stuff they do is pure gimmick but for better or worse they are getting folks to look at pellet grills as a all in one replacement for your standard $199 Walmart/Target gas grill.  My issue is now its the "popular" thing to have on your deck and show off to folks and that is not sustainable in the long run.

In the big picture of backyard BBQ, I think wood-pellet grills are still relatively unknown. Yes they have been around for a long time, but there are a ton of people that have no clue what they are. I think our views are skewed because we are on a pellet grill specific forum. I have 10 or so friends that all own Traegers and of them, I am the only one who is on a BBQ specific forum. So I think his numbers may not be as out of line as we think. Andrus's goal is to make Traeger a household name, something akin to Weber. He is a marketing genius. He has aligned himself with BBQ celebrity and is flooding social media with ads and videos. I am listening to the Dan Patrick show on Fox Sports and they talk about their Traeger every day (of course Traeger is a show sponsor).  I don't think their goal is to have a Timberline in every home, but to have a Traeger in every home. They are looking to be a gas grill/charcoal grill replacement. To the lay person who is not a BBQ savant, a digitally controlled grill that gives wood grilled flavor is very intriguing.

 

You said what I wanted to say better.

+2

Previous responses don't account for us on PF not being your typical pellet user.   We're the far end of the bell curve.  I suspect Andrus will be successful.

DK

PS I was that one guy who said I would buy another Traeger

When i meet new people and we are sharing our interests/passions/obsessions i inevitably talk about BBQ. At some point equipment comes up and i tell them that i cook with pellets, 9 times out of 10 the response is "oh you cook on a Traeger".  I usually say something like ...same idea, different brand.  And leave it at that.

Its been amazing the questions I get from my friends about my Traeger since they started advertising on the DP show specifically. Some of the stuff they do is pure gimmick but for better or worse they are getting folks to look at pellet grills as a all in one replacement for your standard $199 Walmart/Target gas grill.  My issue is now its the "popular" thing to have on your deck and show off to folks and that is not sustainable in the long run.

It's not sustainable because the grills last a long time.  So the Traeger loyalists will usually only buy one in their lifetimes.  Pit manufacturers try to counter that lack of churn by selling private label consumables.  Weber took an additional route by periodically introducing their new and improved models.  At a church function where several of us brought charcoal grills, more than half of the Weber owners had added a Performer or Summit (I think) to their old kettles.  It may work for Traeger.

I was bored so I looked up average sales of most pellet grill companies. Memphis is skewed due to them being a whollowned subsidiary of Dalsin Industries. I excluded Firecraft since I would not find the data. I included Weber even though they don't currently have a pellet grill just for comparison.

Company Annual Sales in Millions

Weber-Stephen 1636.9
Traeger Pellet Grills LLC 100.447
Memphis (Dalsin Industries) 44.54
Cookshack 9.16
Mak Metals, Inc 6.25
Yoder Smokers 6
Camp Chef (Logan Outdoor Products, LLC) 5.26
GMG Products LLC 3.23
Kuma Stoves, Inc 2.58
Louisiana Grills (Dansons) 1.52
Pitt Boss (Dansons) 1.52
Rec Tec .23
Smokin Brothers .18
Blaz'n Grill Works .13

I am not sure where these numbers come from since several of these companies are privately held.  So these might just be someone's guess as to their numbers.  Traeger sells pellets, so I don't know what % of sales is pits and what is pellets.

And the GMG number makes no sense to me.  If you average the GMG pits and come up with an average price of $500 per grill, $3.23 million would be sales of about 6,200 pits per year -- and I have reason to believe they are selling more than that yearly.  Or is my math wrong?  And the Cookshack number seems wrong.

Cookshack makes electric smokers too, MAK is a metal fabrication 1st and a pellet bbq manufacture 2nd, Hearthland noted, I think Yoder sells a lot more offsets then pellet units, Kuma does stoves, etc...so from just the pellet unit standpoint, the numbers are very skewed...unless you know theses number are just from their pellet unit sales...And I do not know, because they are a private company, as most of these are, so not sure where you are getting your sales figures from, but I would have to say that GMG & Cookshack do more then what you are showing...

It is what I have thought since about 2010.  I really thought they would be fading by now...But Name recognition...You eat Jell-O and blow your nose in a Kleenex...you don't eat gelatin and blow your nose in a tissue...

Traeger is playing catch up at this point.

I got all of the data from D & B Hoovers website (Dunn and Bradstreet data base). I am not 100% sure how accurate or up to date the numbers are, but I went with what they had. Take it for what its worth. I'm just trying to show that Traeger still has a majority market share and that on the grand scheme of things, pellet cooker companies are not all as big as you would think.

And the GMG number makes no sense to me.  If you average the GMG pits and come up with an average price of $500 per grill, $3.23 million would be sales of about 6,200 pits per year -- and I have reason to believe they are selling more than that yearly.  Or is my math wrong?  And the Cookshack number seems wrong.

i would guess that number is based on wholesale sales to dealers, so that number could be closer to 10,000+ units depending on what the retail markup is.


 

Are any of the Traeger unit's built in the USA? or are they all from China?

That's the advantage you have when you are first to market.

Name recognition.

Yes, Traeger isn't going to convince many purists (like 70% of the people on this forum) that they make a better pellet grill than anyone else.

What they will be able to do is convince people with the 3 year old Home Depot Charbroil gas burner that is rusting with 2 bad burners that a Traeger is far better than that and that the Charbroil owner's wife will like something she just has to set the temp for vs lighting gas burners and changing tanks.

Obviously it's a pump and dump ploy by the new owner.

Marketing $$$, build sales.  Make it look like it's taking off like a rocket, IPO, sell stock and run.

Are any of the Traeger unit's built in the USA? or are they all from China?

I don't know for sure, but if you're trying to grow mass market share you're going to go China on that route.

You're not going to hit th entry level Charbroil and low end Weber customers by making a solid-built-in-America grill and do it for $300-$600 a grill.
There focus is all about market share right now funded by marketing.  That means the money is being spent in marketing and less in materials and R&D.

Are any of the Traeger unit's built in the USA? or are they all from China?

All made in China afaik.