Ok, I'm in! One ton Tuesday!!! BTW so far I'm actually very impressed with this distributor. I'm going to put him in touch with Chris so he gets this squared away. He's a hard working young man with a lot going for him.
The Okies that you knew are gone! The name was sold and you are buying a different pellet. It may in fact be a good pellet or it may be a bad pellet. You need to do your own homework. I for one am not happy with the way the new company initially tried giving the impression that they were offering the same pellets that were known and loved. That to me is a deceitful practice.
All pellet aggregators are the same, old oakie plats were like 3 different things all in the same bags. Northern warmth came out, we are selling oakies under a new name. Oh except their douglas fir sucked a big one. Lord knows what the super spruce is, or if it will always be the same. This year they fixed the douglas fir by releasing the supreme, but who knows if they keep that up, maybe bear mountain runs short and they put some purcells in the bags to keep them on the shelves. Buy from a brand that runs their own mills and have a shot of knowing what you are buying next.
Eagle Valley New Okies are LG's for what its worth. But ya never know when either will do the switch a rue on ya...........
Well since you are taking a direct shot at me daffonce...let me respond.... First off...not all aggregators are the same. Show me another one in New England that has spent millions ...yes millions of dollars buying land, erecting a plant, buying over 100 rail cars so we can bring in product from all over the country to be packaged perfectly ...almost in most customers back yard and provide employment for over a dozen people, truckers etc... right there in Upton MA....let me help you ...no one else!!! When we were bagging and selling Okies from the plant in Kelowna BC, Western Canada...the only way to do it properly and maintain any type of quality control was to ship them in bulk and then bag them there in Upton...until the railway in BC that serviced the mill when out of business and we couldn't get rail service. That forced us to go elsewhere and use other Western Canadian mill's product which for the most part wasn't an issue. That company went out of business last year, and the bank auctioned off the mill, but did sell off the naming rights to someone else, who later started the Okanagan brand up again...But 3 months before that happened is when "Northern Warmth" was born and retained most of the dealers that were selling the Okanagan brand...you may see some dealers with both brands today....and some only carry the Northern Warmth or Okanagan brand.....the market will pick which one works best for them.... The Pinnacle Douglas Fir you are referring too...didn't "suck" as we have sold thousand of tons of it this year to many dealers....when you compare it to the Bear Mtn product, some will find it not as good, but it's also a good bit cheaper and for many customers in NE...it works just fine. Yes we have Bear Mtn pellets this year, which are bagged as Northern Warmth Supreme Douglas Fir and I see no reason why we won't have this pellet far into the future....as for the Super Spruce, it comes from the Princeton BC pellet mill....and it's our business model NOT to change suppliers ...we want to create some consistency with our brands..... Purcell is no more...the brand has been retired....we will be bagging the North Idaho Douglas Fir pellet in a new brand called Minute Man Douglas Fir.....the last of the Purcell's will be leaving the plant very shortly.....so if you want them, I suggest you pick them up.....The Purely Pine has always been from GABiomass....even when they were sold as Gold's. So why is this done....the answer is very simple.....if we can't bulk them in this way, we wouldn't bring them in at all and the pellet possibly wouldn't be available or certainly not in the volume we can provide...The old way of bringing pellets from that far away is to bag them and ship in either a van or boxcar and unload once at destination in NE...most of the time they come in ...let's just say, not in an ideal condition and we found there to be too much damage...thus the idea to bag them closer to the end customer. There are others bringing pellets into a warehouse in Quebec and then shipping from there down into the market, but some dealers don't like having to handle 60 or 65 bag pallets....or in the case of one mill this season, the packaging was so bad, dealers refused loads....regardless of the price...it was simply too much work to put them back together, it wasn't worth the hassle.....for others, it was not a big deal...that is each dealer's own call .... So bottomline daffonce.....we have committed millions of dollars to bring in what we feel is a better quality pellet that normally wouldn't be available to the NE market, for those that would like them, creating employment and at the same time with the help of a great team at Upton, trying to fill a void that the market has shown a demand for and are committed to the industry and to do so properly takes, money, proper customer service, buckets more money for inventory and patience to see a ROI and being a proper corporate citizen in the city of Upton.....it's not something we took on lightly and have backed it up with our check book and feel the market needs what we do ...I guess time will tell if we made the right call...but so far, we have had very favorable response..... Have we made some mistakes in the past..of course we have, but have tried to fix them as soon as they are brought to our attention and feel we are filling a void in the market......there are literally dozens of brands to choose from as a consumer in New England...maybe the greatest variety in all of North America, and there are other very good brands out there to choose from....so you can use our pellets or someone else's.....you are free to choose.
Fair response. But his main point remains the same. If, in the future, there are supply issues, better deal, whatever may come up. Your bags could possibly be filled with other product that may be better or it may be worse. It has happened in the past by your own admission. So wouldnt it make sense to buy from a producer that bags their own pellets? I am sure you wouldnt advertise a change in mill where your pellets are sold. You share some information here, but we are such a small community I doubt it moves the needle on any direction.
Minute Man is a new brand? I still have a stack of them in my basement that were purchased at Tractor Supply back in 2014. They were the same product as the Okanagan Golds back then (GABiomass). Multiple attempts were made on this very forum to learn more about them, but no one here would own up to knowing anything - like it was a big secret or something. Now the same brand name shows up a couple years later, hmmmm. How many different flavors of Minute Man will there be now? What is the purpose of having a different line of products, why not just keep everything branded as northern Warmth? Will the Minute Man still be sold at Tractor Supply?
This is my 9th year selling wood pellets in New England....in that time, I have learned what works and what doesn't.....I have also learned that if changing suppliers....test test test and then test some more. Let dealers know what you are trying to accomplish and why and why it would be a good thing to do...and yes ....that was a painful lesson to learn......don't take for granted someone's word for it...so, you can be assured, that IF changes have to be made in the future, dealers will know about before it will be done......that I can assure you ....
Bucks Pellets in Fountainville PA is the closest I have to you and if he acts fast, I have 2 tons available...that's it.....he does have the NW Supreme Douglas Fir in stock and will for the rest of the season....(and yes they are Purcell in the North Idaho bag)
The Minute Man brand was sold for one season to Tractor Supply and had yellow pine pellets in the bag (GABiomass)...but they hit a snag and the order was never completed...the wholesaler moved on and not in the industry I think and the brand control was given to the plant....which when I started with them was revived. No they will not be available at Tractor Supply.....and it looks like there will be 4 four flavors of MM....Spruce, Pine, North Idaho DFir and the Supreme Douglas Fir...but the offering will be small and as the vast majority of the dealer will have the Northern Warmth brand....I had nothing to do with the brand back in 2014 and didn't till earlier this year....same purpose as why NEWP has 2 brands, Cubex has 3 I think,..Maine 2, Energex 2 or 3 ...and the list goes on and on......it helps for better coverage in some markets
