Good Neighbor Podcast: Milton & More
Bringing Together Local Businesses & Neighbors of Milton, Crabapple, and Hickory Flat
Good Neighbor Podcast: Milton & More
Expert Episode: Meet Ron Bain from Bar-B-Clean North Atlanta
Ever wondered what's really hiding beneath those crusty grill grates? Ron Bain, owner of Bar-B-Clean North Atlanta, reveals the secrets to extending the life of your outdoor cooking investment. After a 30-year corporate career, Ron and his wife Michelle took the entrepreneurial leap to become the first Bar-B-Clean franchise owners in Atlanta, bringing specialized grill cleaning and repair services to local homeowners.
The eye-opening conversation explores why expensive stainless steel grills actually require more maintenance than cheaper alternatives. "That $2,000+ grill will rust and corrode and be rendered useless if it's not taken care of," Ron explains, recommending professional cleaning every 40-50 uses. His team's meticulous process involves commercial steam cleaners, angle grinders with wire wheels, and powerful degreasers to restore grills to their former glory.
Ron shares invaluable advice for homebuyers and sellers regarding outdoor kitchens, warning that home inspectors typically overlook these expensive investments. "There's been a lot of heartache with folks purchasing new homes with outdoor kitchens only to find out the grill is actually useless," he notes. His practical maintenance tips include scraping both sides of grates and lining drip pans with foil to prevent corrosion.
The conversation reflects both the challenges and rewards of small business ownership. As Ron puts it, "When you have your own business, you wake up every morning unemployed" – a reminder of the daily hustle required to succeed. Yet his passion for helping customers preserve their investments shines through. Ready to give your grill the care it deserves? Contact the Bar-B-Clean team at 470-239-6720 or visit their website to schedule your service.
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Stacey Poehler.
Speaker 2:Good morning everyone. I'm excited to be talking with Ron Bain. He is the owner of a local company called Barbecue Clean North Atlanta. Welcome, ron.
Speaker 3:Hello, good morning.
Speaker 2:Good morning. So why don't you start off by telling us about Barbecue Clean North Atlanta. Welcome Ron. Hello. Good morning Good morning.
Speaker 3:So why don't you start off by telling us about Barbecue Clean? Yeah, barbecue Clean is a company that started in Southern California like 10, 12 years ago. That began to franchise heavily a couple of years ago and I'd had a 30-year corporate career in sales that I was but I had an entrepreneurial itch, let's say I was looking for to have our own business for my wife and I both, and so we worked with the franchise consultant for gosh many months. We looked at all kinds of opportunities and BarbieClean just stuck out to us first, ones to buy in Atlanta, and we really liked the business model and we love the, the value it brings to our customers and it just Michelle and I both. Just that's the one for us and it's been a lot of fun. We've been a steep learning curve over the last year but we've really enjoyed it and made a lot of great connections with our clients and customers.
Speaker 2:Great, great. So explain a little bit more about what you do and what a client can expect, and what are some of the different services that Barbecue Clean is providing.
Speaker 3:Primarily Barbecue Clean started just on cleaning alone. We clean grills. Our process takes about two and a half three hours. It's very involved. We use a commercial steam cleaner and various tools to get it as clean as possible. A commercial steam cleaner and various tools to get it as clean as possible. A grill, over time will stain. The stainless steel will stain, so we can't necessarily make it always shine, but it will be clean to the touch. That's our commitment.
Speaker 3:But other than cleaning, we do a lot of repair work and we've found that is definitely a needed service because, just like any appliance, things break and it's a unique category. So that's a big part of our business. And then the other part is we sell grills. So sometimes we'll be at someone's built-in kitchen. The grill needs to be replaced and we can find a grill that fits that existing cutout. So that's another part of our business. And then we do a lot of work on smokers, big green eggs, treggers, all kinds of repair work as well as cleaning. And then the last thing service we have is a diagnostic visit.
Speaker 3:A lot of times people aren't sure if it's worth repairing the grill or cleaning the grill. Something's wrong with it and for $125, we'll go out and do a complete assessment of the grill, the condition, the gas flow, everything. And then, if the customer chooses to move forward with us, $75 of that goes back as a credit towards whatever service is needed.
Speaker 2:Got it, got it. That's great. And how about you yourself? Do you like to grill, and what type of grill do you use?
Speaker 3:Yes, we do so. It's funny. That's one of the things. I guess that stuck out to us when we bought Barbie. Clean is we redid our deck a few years ago and we love to entertain and we love to have our outdoor space, and so we've built an outdoor kitchen on the deck and I've got my green egg, I've got a Napoleon grill, I have a Blackstone and I have another grill upstairs.
Speaker 3:Obviously, we love to grill and cook outside, and I think my favorite thing is football season and having my buddies over and be grilling away while we're watching games outside.
Speaker 2:Nice, and what are some of your favorite things to make?
Speaker 3:Oh gosh, I went through so many stages when I got the green egg. I use it for all kinds of pork, shoulder or whatever wings. Recently I've really gotten into my Blackstone. I love cooking on Blackstone I feel like the Waffle House fry cook, but we've tried all kinds of things, from briskets to fajitas, to steaks, of course, and we're carnivores.
Speaker 2:Awesome, awesome. And what else do you guys like to do for fun when you're not working?
Speaker 3:Michelle and I our whole family are big into tennis. We're originally from the West. We've lived here 17 years now, but we never played racquet sports. We moved in the neighborhood and I got tired of people asking me whose tennis team are you on? They're like I don't play tennis. You got to play tennis, so we got into it in our gosh. Our mid early forties, my wife and I both, and our girls, grew up playing tennis. We love it. In fact, our the Barbie Cleans legal business name is Add In Enterprises.
Speaker 2:Nice, I like that.
Speaker 3:You're the connection there.
Speaker 2:So are there any myths or misperceptions that you think are out there about cleaning grills or just the industry in general? Or for kitchens, I would say this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so you know, obviously learn a lot about grills over the last year more than I ever could imagine, but a lot of, I would say. Most of our customers have to justify our service. They've spent some money $2,000 and up on a grill and the actual higher end grills they are. It's more important, even more important to keep those clean and maintained versus a cheaper grill you might buy at a home center. It's just because they're made out of stainless steel, which is great material for you to cook on, but stainless steel will rust and great material for you to cook on, but stainless steel will rust and corrode and be rendered useless if it's not taken care of. And so that's really why our service is needed For a deep cleaning like we do. We say every 40 to 50 cooks. You should have a deep clean. Either you do it yourself or you hire a company like ours.
Speaker 3:Otherwise, a couple things are going to happen. Number one the components, the burners, igniters, all that stuff won't operate as well and it won't last as long. They'll end up eventually corroding. Even worse than that is because you can replace the parts or it can be quite expensive, but if the firebox itself starts to corrode, that's where you got a real problem. The worst thing that people can do with the grill is to use it throughout the summer, fall, and if you don't really use it in the winter and it just sits there dirty all winter, that's the worst thing you can do with the grill. Number one varmints, critters like that, but also it will. That's where a lot of damage is done with the grill. Number one varmints, critters like that, ick, but also it will.
Speaker 2:That's where a lot of damage is done to the grill is when it's sitting there dirty during the winter. Yeah, sure, I'm sure. It sounds like you had a long career in the corporate world and have been able to sort of transition to being a business owner. Have there been any struggles or hurdles along the way that you've faced that you feel like this has challenged you and you've grown a little bit since starting Barber Clean.
Speaker 3:Oh my gosh. Yeah, yes, I know any business owner would tell you there's. It's every day. A friend of mine told me and it's true is like when you're your own, have your own business, you wake up every morning unemployed. You gotta go. You wake up every morning unemployed, you got to go. You got to go and hustle and find your customers. It takes time. We're on a good growth path, about as expected, but it takes a couple, two, three years to build up your clientele, and so I knew that, going into it Beyond that, there's just been a gazillion challenges, but we learned from every one of them. We had a new grill that we weren't familiar with. That brand had ran into that issue. Then we got to go find the technical support people and learn. It's been a steep learning curve but we really enjoyed it. We really have Awesome, awesome.
Speaker 2:Maybe can you just talk. I know you mentioned that it starts with the steam clean, but maybe just walk us a little bit more through the process so people can understand why it takes two and a half hours the service if they're not home.
Speaker 3:But if they're home we can walk the customer through a diagnostic checklist of the grill what's the gas flow like, are all the burners operating, what's the corrosion, et cetera. We walk through all that and assess what kind of work needs to happen on the grill. That's the first part. Then we literally there's not a lot of, there's not rocket science to clean a grill. There really isn't. It's just it's dirty and it's time consuming.
Speaker 3:But we scrape all the loose stuff down in the firebox, we vacuum that out, then we use an angle grinder with a wire wheel on it, stainless steel wire wheel. It gets those really tough caked on areas and then we put a very heavy duty degreaser in there and let it sit. We then scrub that, we wipe it down and then we finish up actually with the steam cleaner, because that steam cleaner what it does is it helps get in all the little nooks and crannies, but it also sanitizes that inside that grill because we had that nasty degreaser in there. And then we use for the grates and the burners, depending on the grill, whatever components can come out. We use that angle grinder and wire wheel on that as well to get all that nasty stuff off, and so it takes a few hours to get it done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and do you offer any products or recommend any products or tools that people should use weekly when they use their grill and how to maintain it a little bit better? The results last a little longer so two things I'd say.
Speaker 3:The easiest one people ask all the time like how can I keep it clean? The only way you keep a grill clean is don't use it, because it's just it's going to get dirty. But what customers should always do is not only scrape the top of the grates but every once in a while turn those grates over and scrape that as well, because it gets gunked up on the bottom. A lot of times that's where the corrosion will begin to start, on the bottom, because they're not looking at that. So scrape both sides. The other thing I would say is the drip pan. Just put some aluminum foil down on top of your drip pan. It lasts a lot longer that way. You just every once in a while throw away that foil with all that grease and grime and it doesn't sit on that drip pan and again start corrosion.
Speaker 2:Got it. Got it Anything else that you haven't had a chance to share about Barbecue Clean, that you want to make sure our listeners know.
Speaker 3:I would say that one of the things that we've had a lot of customers call us after they purchased a home with an outdoor kitchen and there's ends up being a lot of issues with the grill that like, is there upset Because the home inspectors, for whatever reason, they don't look at it. I would say, if you're looking at buying a home with an outdoor kitchen, make sure you have someone like us come take a look at it. Do a diagnostic to understand what's come along with the property. Or, if you're going to sell a house, same thing Get it to the grill up to snuff as well before you sell, because it's been a lot of there's been a lot of heartache with folks purchasing new homes with back outdoor kitchens and to find out that the grill is actually useless.
Speaker 2:Got it. That makes a lot of sense, good deal, and I know folks are going to want to reach out and get their grill clean before the summer starts, so can you share your contact info and how folks can book an appointment?
Speaker 3:Absolutely so the best there's a, because every grill is a little bit different. Ideally, someone would call us and my wife, michelle. We call her the Barbie queen and she's fantastic and loves to talk to our customers. Call us at 470-239-6720. That goes directly to Michelle and she will walk somebody through a process as they answer the questions. We've got a bunch of questions. We have to understand how to quote the project and then get you on the calendar. We're starting to get busy as the weather warms up, but our typically we try to get someone scheduled within seven to 10 days. Okay, we've got three guys running full time right now.
Speaker 2:Okay, and do you have a website that folks can check out as well?
Speaker 3:It's at wwwbar-be-cleancom. Forward slash North North Atlanta. Perfect barbiecleancom. Forward slash North Atlanta.
Speaker 2:Awesome. Thank you so much for joining us today, ron. I think I learned a lot, and I hope everyone else did too.
Speaker 3:Thank you, stacey, I appreciate the opportunity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was great.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast Milton More. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPMiltoncom. That's GNPMiltoncom, or call 470-664-4930.