HomeBBQ.com is a very nice site offering a ton of free barbecue information. You can also buy their quality barbecue rubs and sauces they actually use while cooking for HomeBBQ.com competition team.

So anyway, Kevin was discussing how the increasing price of gas has kept him and his team from traveling to competitions further away from his home base and out of state.

You can read Kevin’s post right here!

Kevin’s fear is some of the smaller events who depend on out of state cooking teams or teams who travel further distances will start to go away because teams will no longer travel to them.

Now there is no debating the price of gas has made it very difficult for many people to make their bills much less travel all over the country to attend barbecue competitions.

But I have a real problem with the mentally of people who say ” I cant afford this ” or “this is too expensive”

I think the better question to ask is ” How can I afford it?”

However it’s totally understandable–I mean I used to say those same words until I started reading and hanging around successful people.

You see, what I’ve learned is once you say, ” I can’t” your mind automatically shuts down. You loose your resourcefulness.

But if you ask yourself ” How can I do something” or “How can afford it” your mind goes to work.

Don’t believe me? Fine, try it yourself…

Next time you find yourself in a tough situation and you find yourself saying ” I cant afford this, or I can’t do this, or I can’t figure this out” tell your brain to STOP!

Then you’ll want to grab a sheet of paper and write “How Can I (blank)” at the top of your paper. Next, just start answering your question…

You’ll be amazed how creative your mind can be!

I left a comment in Kevin’s blog stating I don’t think gas is effecting my family all that much. While we do feel a pinch it’s not to the point where we have to stay home, pull the curtains shut and lock the doors.

You see, what I did is I started to ask myself the question. “How can I afford it?” or “How can I make more money for my family?”

So what I’ve done is create a business around my passion for barbecue. That’s right BBQFreaks.com is a business and anytime I travel to a barbecue event, restaurant or whatever, I make a note of my miles and I keep all copies of my receipts.

If I attend a competition I hand out flyer’s, business cards and t-shirts. If I eat at a BBQ Restaurant I’ll mention it in my blog and do a review.

In other words I’ve created a perfectly legal and ethical way to enjoy barbecue passion and to also build and grow a business to take advantages of certain tax breaks offered by the U.S. Government.

And here’s the other thing, I’m able to make some extra money with my business so I’m able to EXPAND my means– rather than shrink away.

So many of us allow our salary to dictate our lifestyle–why not make a salary to suit your lifestyle?

I know these can be very obscure and controversial comments to you and I understand this. I was the same way. All I’m asking you to do is open your mind and ask yourself ” How Can I” instead of saying ” I can’t”

After all, you owe it to your Country, your family and most importantly–you owe it to yourself!

Now go smoke something, Bill Parlaman

If you enjoyed this please post your thoughts in the comment box below. I’d love to know what you’re thinking and what’s going through your mind.

If you own a barbecue business and you would like to discover unconventional ways to market your business please shoot me an email or contact me through my blog!

Its all about underground maverick marketing baby!

One of the gentlemen asked for an opinion on his website design.

Now when I looked at his website it was clearly a home made job, however, I think “bootstrapping” when you’re just starting out is the way to go.

There’s something magical about creating something out of nothing or using your limited resources to create an excellent marketing plan.

So anyway, one of the first things I noticed on this gentleman’s site was the lack of testimonials.

The funny thing is, NOT using testimonials in your marketing is one of the biggest mistakes I see entrepreneurs and business owners making with their marketing materials.

It’s been said what others say about you, your company, your products and your services is way more believable than anything you can say about yourself.

What you say about yourself is a claim–when your happy customer makes a statement about you — it’s a fact!

Get it? Good, lets keep going…

You see, people are more and more skeptical of marketing and advertisements especially on-line.

So its really up to you to over come their skepticism and one of the best ways to do this is by using testimonials.

It’s social proof!

So what should a good testimonial look like?

Well for starters a testimonial should be a “before and after” picture.

Before I was fat- now I’m skinny, before I had problems remembering now I remember everything, before I was a slow reader- now I read 50 times faster…

You get the picture don’t you?

Testimonials should also be specific and not general. You don’t want people to say you have the “best barbecue” or the “juiciest brisket” or the “biggest pulled pork sandwiches.”

You’ll also want to make a list of all features, benefits and what you want your marketing to prove and then–make a list of any objections, doubts, fears or questions your customers might have and tailor your testimonials specifically to prove your claim and to remove all doubts and fears.

So here’s an example of a very good Testimonial…

” I used xyz barbecue cater last year and things didn’t go so well. The food was cold, there wasn’t enough BBQ to go around and the price was much higher than originally quoted.

But using BBQ Freaks Catering Company, the food was piping hot, there was more than enough food to go around and the final invoice matched my original quote. All my guests left very full and with huge smiles on their faces.

Bill Parlaman
Exton, PA”

Oh and the other thing, whatever you do, make sure you list the Full Name, City and State in which they live.

Again, people are skeptical. I’ve seen way too many testimonials saying,” John S., PA”

Its also not a bad idea to put the picture of the person making the testimonial on your website. This gives even more social proof!

So there you have it. Now this is not the end all be all of writing a good testimonial but it will get you started. And after all, if you don’t start, you’ll never finish!

Now go smoke something, Bill Parlaman

If you enjoyed this please feel free to post a comment below in the comment section of the blog. I really would love to hear from you.

And if you have any ideas on other ways of crafting your testimonials please feel free to post them too! I’d love to read them.

If you didn’t get a chance to read it you can read about it right here

Well I posed the same question to various barbecue forums around the net and and the topic really took off.

If you would like to read these posts you can get them here
and right here

I think it’s safe to say most people felt it was perfectly fine to use the name of the restaurant when a bad review is in order.

Others felt it was unfair to judge a barbecue joint just from one visit and without bringing my displeasure to the owners attention.

There were a few people who had very strong opinions stating only professional restaurant critics should review restaurants, ( this is true, I am not a professional critic but I also believe you do not have to wait around for an expert fairy to fly in your window and tap you on the head declaring you an expert on something).

There were others who felt taste was a matter of opinion. In other words, every one’s taste buds are different and therefore what is good to one person, may taste bad to another.

And still others who felt I was a “despicable blogger” with self serving mumbo-jumbo looking to ruin the world with my horrid opinions of the world.

Through all of this I did have some pretty good take aways– mainly I will continue to review barbecue restaurants because there seems to be a need for it.

With this said, I will only review barbecue restaurants under the following conditions:

1. I will eat at the restaurant more than once.

2. If I have a particularly bad meal I will bring it to the attention of the restaurant owner or manager to see if they remedy the problem.

3. I will contact the restaurant via mail or e-mail when I post a poor or good review so they may respond if they wish.

All in all I think I’ve made a decision that’s fair to my readers and fair to barbecue restaurants.

Now go smoke something, Bill Parlaman

P.S. Be on the look out for an eye opening interview I did with Best Selling Author and International Barbecue Champion, Rockin Ronnie Shewchuck.

In this interview Rockin Ronnie reveals some of his secrets for creating mouth watering barbecue and what it really takes to get your barbecue cook book published!

You can learn more about Rocking Ronnie right here!

If you’ve enjoyed this, please pass it along to a few of your friends, and if you have any comments please leave them right here on my blog.

And let me tell you, I am exhausted!

Chasing after 3 kids at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure for 8 hours a day in the hot Florida sun can take it’s toll on you.

View of Island Of Adventure and a very scary roller coaster, “The Incredible Hulk!”

But we had a great time and if you have older kids (mine are 6,8 and 9 and past the Disney Princess stage) you’ll want to check these parks out sometime. The rides are just awesome, something that Disney just can’t offer in my opinion.

So we ate at the “Rain Forest Cafe” for lunch one day and it got me thinking.

You see if you’ve never eaten at the Rain Forest Cafe (This was my first time) it’s set up with a rain forest theme complete with mechanical elephants, gorillas, monkeys and cougars. There are also simulated thunderstorms that pop off every so often and the animals go nuts. It’s a pretty cool experience.

An Inside view of the Rain forest Cafe

We ordered a fairly typical lunch, I had a burger and fries with a couple of beers, Michelle ordered a salad with iced tea. We had nachos for appetizers and the girls ordered chicken nuggets with fruit smoothies in a souvenir glass.

Now when we got the check I was a little shocked– the check totaled $135.00! ( By the way, those two smoothies the girls ordered in the souvenir glasses…$11.25… a piece!)

Now we’re on vacation so we’re not going to complain. Its not like we do this everyday but it got me thinking about other businesses and specifically your barbecue business.

You see, people were not necessarily coming in for the food. Nope, I’m pretty sure you can get burgers, fries, chicken nuggets and salads almost anywhere– and for much cheaper.

But you see, the reason people were standing in line to eat over priced and just so-so food was because of the EXPERIENCE!

Another view of the Rain forest Cafe

The thrill of eating in a rain forest while watching gorillas, elephants and cougars roar as a full fledged lighting storm roars above your head is what people are paying for.

When the hostess calls your name over the loud speaker it’s “Smith, Safari Party of 5, your adventure is about to begin” Not, “Smith party of 5 your table is ready.”

Do you see the difference? Good, lets keep going…

So what I’d like to ask you is, are you giving your customers an experience, or are you just hanging your hat on your food?

You know, I hear this a lot from Barbecue caterers and restaurant owners…my food speaks for itself.

We’ll I’m here to tell you–once someone cooks better barbecue then you ( and there are people out there, somewhere believe me) then what are you going to do?

So I’d like to ask you, how can you give your customers an experience?

How can you set yourself apart from every other Tom, Dick and Harry BBQ Cater or Restaurant already out there.

Why should someone hire you to cater their next party or come to your restaurant over any of your competition?

I’d love to hear your ideas and I’ll share some of mine in a few days.

Now go smoke something, Bill Parlaman

If you’ve enjoyed this, please pass it along to a few of your friends, and if you have any comments please leave them right here on my blog.

Now is it me, or does it seem like more and more barbecue restaurants and catering companies are going out of business while the popularity of barbecue is sky-rocking?

It doesn’t make sense, does it?

I mean it’s here today– gone tomorrow for most BBQ joints.

But here’s the problem, most barbecue business are dying of self inflected wounds.

Here, let me explain….

My girlfriend and I drove from Philly to Indianapolis over the Memorial Day weekend to catch the Indy 500.

By the way, if you missed it you’ll want to read about it here…www.bbqfreaks.com/blog/2008/05/27/my-first-trip-to-indy/)

So anyway, as luck would have it we found a barbecue restaurant along the way in Springfield, Ohio. It was perfect timing because we had been driving for a long while and it was just about dinner time.

And being the barbecue connoisseur I am– we decided to stop in.

Now I won’t mention the name of this restaurant because I’m not looking to embarrass anyone but I do think it’s something you’ll want to pay close attention to if you’re a business owner or thinking about starting your own business.

So if while reading this you’re thinking to yourself, “But my business is different” you’ve already missed the point Bubba!

After all, its not the bus you see coming you’ll have to worry about– its the one you don’t see that does the damage!

Here’s The BBQFreak in front of BBQ Joint I stopped in on my way to the INDY 500

Now let me first say the staff was very friendly and very helpful– but I’m sad to say that the food was not good.

I ordered the barbecue platter which consisted of pulled chicken, pulled pork and brisket. This platter came with my choice of sides which I ordered the corn bread and the hush puppies.

Here’s my barbecue platter

Oh yeah, and did I mention there was virtually no smoke flavor at all?

Now in all fairness this could have been a one time deal. Maybe their food is extremely good the other 364 days of the year but not on this day.

Here’s another shot of the Pulled Chicken, Pulled Pork and Brisket Platter

I should also mention to they only had one bathroom available because the womans room was out of service.

Now I understand things happen–but the usable restroom was filthy.

So here’s the thing, this was my first and last visit to this restaurant because…

First impressions count for everything!

You only have one shot to impress and unfortunately this place did not.

In business you need to be on top of your game constantly.

You cant let your guard down for one moment or another business is going to do it better and steal your customers.

But even in all of this, there was still a way they could have gotten me back… but as too often is the case, they missed the mark on this one as well.

So here’s a free little tip you can start using today in your business if you’re smart…

They didn’t get any of my information such as name, address, phone number or even my email address.

See had they done this, and had they been smart enough to actually use it, they could have kept in touch with me and asked about my experience at their restaurant.

Once they discovered I was disappointed with my meal they could have easily attempted fix the problem by offering me some sort of coupon or offer either for a future free dinner or a percentage off of my next visit.

Now if they were really smart, and suppose I didn’t have a bad experience, they could still send me coupons for meals…because happy customers are good customers.

Now in all fairness I was just traveling through and the only time I would ever consider going back would be on my next trip from Philly to the Indy 500 but you can bet your bottom dollar buckaroo–I’ll never recommend this restaurant to anyone.

So you’ll want to ask yourself, what first impressions are you giving your customers?

Do you have a system in place for collecting you’re customers information so you can stay in constant contact with them?

If you don’t– you better hop to it or someone else will…

Now Go Smoke Something, Bill Parlaman

P.S. These two tips literally cost next to nothing to implement but will generate a ton of cash for your business. Now get moving!

If you’ve enjoyed this, please pass it along to a few of your friends, and if you have any comments please leave them right here on my blog.