I said I would walk through my thought process for how I chose a particular premium pellet grill, so here’s basically a summary of what I did and the factors that helped me make the decision for ME:
Besides made in USA, which all of these pits are (to the best of my knowledge):
Why I chose: MAK
Top 3 reasons why:
1. Established brand that has been an innovator since the Traeger Patent Expired
2. Commitment to the existing customers on their flagship middle model. Pretty much every innovation they’ve come up with over the past 10 years can be retrofitted into a MAK 2 Star from 10 years ago. For me meaning when they invent their next big thing, I’ll most likely be able to add it to my grill instead of buying a new one, so I feel the odds are pretty good I can still play around with new things even on an old grill
3. Quality Materials - Stainless and Aluminized steel that will not rust and heavier gauge than big box store pellet grills
Other Strong Factors in no particular order:
Yoder (480s): In the end Yoder ended up very close. In the past, I usually ignored them because of their looks and the regular paint maintenance required. I studied them hard this go round and that maintenance was still a very small strike in the end as well as the pellet consumption rates usually discussed with them and the winter performance using even more pellets. I have a couple of co workers with them so I’ve gotten lots of feedback about them. It was still a very close contender in the end, but by time I would start adding stainless grates, their super expensive insulation blanket, etc. you start nudging fairly close to the MAK in pricing and I trust the MAK more. The Fireboard partnership made that a very hard final conclusion though as I’m a huge Firebaord fan and would love FB logs of all my pellet cooks from a built in controller.
Cookshack (PG500): Also just as close and (I was quintuple checking my self logic of both Yoder and Cookshack versus MAK still late last night before I made the final call). In the end, the cookshack also barely missed the mark. It's a proven brand that has been doing this longer than anyone else in the list because they built theirs different than Traeger. The controller is complex which is a good thing for all kinds of fine tuning, but I don’t want to be standing half hunched over pressing little buttons for 15 minutes tuning feed rates and such. If they had developed a mobile app so I could tinker with it sitting at the kitchen table watching, it would have been an even tougher call. I like the thought of the 4 zones and know the PG500 has more searing ability than anything else in the list, but I do feel I’d be constrained by the sizes of the zones. The fairly regular mentions of ash flying everywhere and even landing on food was the final small factor. I know once seasoned that likely goes away and using quality pellets likely helps even more, but the risk of ‘sooty’ food bothers me. I eat a lot of BBQ with my fingers and I expect them to get greasy and such, but they shouldn't turn black from ash on the food and I feared that with the CookShack.
The rest from the short list:
Pitts and Spitts - Still new enough to the pellet world to be relatively unproven, many Texans have no idea what cold is so I question what the Northern performance would be. I actually got to feel one of these beauties up and was impressed with the quality, but the Maverick was an awfully lot like a much much better constructed Traeger…which isn’t at all a bad thing, a pretty proven design. If I wanted purely a pellet smoker, P&S would have been very HIGH on the list.
Lone Star Grillz - Could find no evidence that this grill exists yet. By the description and specs has the potential to be one of the best poopers on the market…if it ever truly comes to be. Sounds like it just keeps getting delayed and delayed.
Smokin Brothers - Too small of a brand, no apparent real searing ability and not very pretty. I’ve seen a couple and they’re well constructed. If I was looking for a smoker only also, this would have moved way up the list. However, I have a hard time moving past their aesthetics every time I visited their site or when I used to see them in a couple local stores.
Blaz’n - Pretty small brand yet even though they've been in the marketplace for a pretty decent amount of time. IMO, they seem to run behind on innovation and their searing setup seems wonky (again my personal opinion). I love their paint jobs and options there. I also love that almost all their 'upgrades' have nice videos demoing them. They do a lot of things right product information wise. However, I was also worried what was going to happen when the owner decides to retire am I'm not confident they have the size/value for someone else to buy them or for an excited current employee to be able to get a loan to continue the business running on.
If you made it this far…all of those listed were strong contenders, those are just the deciding factors for me personally. Some probably seem kinda petty, but when you look at a group of American made and all seemingly top notch quality products, personal preferences do factor into the weeding out process or you’ll be analyzing yourself to death. You just have to make sure you put your top few priorities higher than the petty items. Like if the Yoder seared like a SmokeFire, I’d deal with paint touch up and a smoke stack in trade. Also, if you own one of the brands I didn't pick, sell it and buy a MAK..TOTOALLY just kidding, I'll go back to reinforcing these were the tiny differences that pushed my final decision. I can see why every one of you likely made the decision you did doing the same type of research and having different preferences in your order of importance. I think I could be happy with any of the grills in this list.
Besides made in USA, which all of these pits are (to the best of my knowledge):
Why I chose: MAK
Top 3 reasons why:
1. Established brand that has been an innovator since the Traeger Patent Expired
2. Commitment to the existing customers on their flagship middle model. Pretty much every innovation they’ve come up with over the past 10 years can be retrofitted into a MAK 2 Star from 10 years ago. For me meaning when they invent their next big thing, I’ll most likely be able to add it to my grill instead of buying a new one, so I feel the odds are pretty good I can still play around with new things even on an old grill
3. Quality Materials - Stainless and Aluminized steel that will not rust and heavier gauge than big box store pellet grills
Other Strong Factors in no particular order:
- Meathead’s Platinum Rating and thorough review
- FlameZone - I have realistic expectations of how this will sear a steak, but I think it’s going to be a great burger, chop, chicken, etc. griller. As well, I feel this FlameZone design with the shield around the fire pot creates essentially a partially insulated cooker delivering more heat directly and efficiently to the grates and will hopefully help with wind affecting it
- No Smokestack or external hanging grease bucket, I cover my grills pretty much whenever they are not in use. Both of these items are very annoying when putting a cover on and off of a grill and knocking a grease bucket off of a grill makes me mutter very unkind words
- Lower Cabinet (a place to hide a few too many bbq accessories - for a friend of course so they don't get in trouble), I know it’s not waterproof, but for me on a covered patio with a cover of the grill, pretty safe from elements
- Renowned controller that has been talk of industry for years
- Warmer box/cold smoker - I honestly didn’t think I gave a hoot about this, but as I thought more about it decided I could use it a lot.
- Feedback from MAK FB group and several other BBQ forums, conversations with a few owners including PMs and comments from members here that have one.
- Limited Lifetime warranty
Yoder (480s): In the end Yoder ended up very close. In the past, I usually ignored them because of their looks and the regular paint maintenance required. I studied them hard this go round and that maintenance was still a very small strike in the end as well as the pellet consumption rates usually discussed with them and the winter performance using even more pellets. I have a couple of co workers with them so I’ve gotten lots of feedback about them. It was still a very close contender in the end, but by time I would start adding stainless grates, their super expensive insulation blanket, etc. you start nudging fairly close to the MAK in pricing and I trust the MAK more. The Fireboard partnership made that a very hard final conclusion though as I’m a huge Firebaord fan and would love FB logs of all my pellet cooks from a built in controller.
Cookshack (PG500): Also just as close and (I was quintuple checking my self logic of both Yoder and Cookshack versus MAK still late last night before I made the final call). In the end, the cookshack also barely missed the mark. It's a proven brand that has been doing this longer than anyone else in the list because they built theirs different than Traeger. The controller is complex which is a good thing for all kinds of fine tuning, but I don’t want to be standing half hunched over pressing little buttons for 15 minutes tuning feed rates and such. If they had developed a mobile app so I could tinker with it sitting at the kitchen table watching, it would have been an even tougher call. I like the thought of the 4 zones and know the PG500 has more searing ability than anything else in the list, but I do feel I’d be constrained by the sizes of the zones. The fairly regular mentions of ash flying everywhere and even landing on food was the final small factor. I know once seasoned that likely goes away and using quality pellets likely helps even more, but the risk of ‘sooty’ food bothers me. I eat a lot of BBQ with my fingers and I expect them to get greasy and such, but they shouldn't turn black from ash on the food and I feared that with the CookShack.
The rest from the short list:
Pitts and Spitts - Still new enough to the pellet world to be relatively unproven, many Texans have no idea what cold is so I question what the Northern performance would be. I actually got to feel one of these beauties up and was impressed with the quality, but the Maverick was an awfully lot like a much much better constructed Traeger…which isn’t at all a bad thing, a pretty proven design. If I wanted purely a pellet smoker, P&S would have been very HIGH on the list.
Lone Star Grillz - Could find no evidence that this grill exists yet. By the description and specs has the potential to be one of the best poopers on the market…if it ever truly comes to be. Sounds like it just keeps getting delayed and delayed.
Smokin Brothers - Too small of a brand, no apparent real searing ability and not very pretty. I’ve seen a couple and they’re well constructed. If I was looking for a smoker only also, this would have moved way up the list. However, I have a hard time moving past their aesthetics every time I visited their site or when I used to see them in a couple local stores.
Blaz’n - Pretty small brand yet even though they've been in the marketplace for a pretty decent amount of time. IMO, they seem to run behind on innovation and their searing setup seems wonky (again my personal opinion). I love their paint jobs and options there. I also love that almost all their 'upgrades' have nice videos demoing them. They do a lot of things right product information wise. However, I was also worried what was going to happen when the owner decides to retire am I'm not confident they have the size/value for someone else to buy them or for an excited current employee to be able to get a loan to continue the business running on.
If you made it this far…all of those listed were strong contenders, those are just the deciding factors for me personally. Some probably seem kinda petty, but when you look at a group of American made and all seemingly top notch quality products, personal preferences do factor into the weeding out process or you’ll be analyzing yourself to death. You just have to make sure you put your top few priorities higher than the petty items. Like if the Yoder seared like a SmokeFire, I’d deal with paint touch up and a smoke stack in trade. Also, if you own one of the brands I didn't pick, sell it and buy a MAK..TOTOALLY just kidding, I'll go back to reinforcing these were the tiny differences that pushed my final decision. I can see why every one of you likely made the decision you did doing the same type of research and having different preferences in your order of importance. I think I could be happy with any of the grills in this list.
Please wake me when this is over.
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