How Do You Price a Pizza Oven?

by James Bairey

As a manufacturer and retailer, how do we price your products?

It's an interesting question, and a number of different issues come into play. I believe a higher degree of business transparency is an appropriate strategy in the Internet Age, and it occurred to me that sharing our pricing strategy would make sense – both for us and our customers.

If you have researched pizza oven pricing recently, you will have noticed that the Forno Bravo ovens include all the installation equipment (insulation, mortar, chimney), while our competitors force you to buy all those essential items as costly extras – AND you will have seen that our ovens still cost a lot less than our competitors' ovens. (A Forno Bravo residential pizza oven typically costs between $1,000 and $1,500 less than the "other guys," including shipping.)

You might be wondering: "How can Forno Bravo do it?" There are a few good reasons:

1) As a manufacturer, we purchase large quantities of the highest quality, but very low integration level, raw materials – directly from the original manufacturer. Think calcined aggregates, calcium aluminate and polypropylene fibers. Our raw material costs are a lot lower than those of our competitors who import ovens from Europe or buy their products from contract manufacturers.

2) We actually make our own products – in the USA. We do not purchase items in euros, and we do not have to pay for costly container shipping. Don't forget that pizza ovens are very heavy and are difficult to safely ship. You need to ship the ovens from a city in Italy where they are made to the port by truck; from the Italian port to a U.S. port by sea; through customs; and from the U.S. port to the importer's warehouse by truck. You don't need to know the exact numbers (though of course as a former importer we do) to know that there is a very high "per oven" cost to simply ship the oven from the European manufacturer to California.

3) Finally, Forno Bravo is the highest unit volume pizza oven manufacturer and seller (probably by a very large margin) in the U.S. This brings a number of benefits to you, the consumer or dealer installing the oven. Our high unit volumes drive up our efficiency and they drive down our manufacturing costs. Also, because we are selling a lot of ovens, we do not need to make as large a profit on each oven as we would if we were selling a much smaller number.

The bottom line? We believe Forno Bravo sells ovens that are significantly better than our competitors' ovens in terms of design and quality of materials, and that our ovens are much more complete than our competitors' because they include the things you always need to install your oven – all at a price significantly lower than our competitors offer.

Condensed from James' original post on the Wood-Fired Blog. See full post for a lot more information on our shipping costs and crate fees, and how Forno Bravo ovens are like the iPad.

Recipe: Roasted Artichokes With Capers, Chevre and Herbed Breadcrumbs

We hope you enjoy this month’s featured recipe from the Forno Bravo Community Cookbook, written by our moderator Dan Compton. Want to add your own recipe? Take a few moments to create a free Community Cookbook account!

Roasted Artichokes With Capers, Chevre and Herbed Breadcrumbs

Fresh artichokes are an unfairly overlooked denizen of the supermarket produce aisle. Most people take one look at their spiky, reptilian-looking armor and head two aisles over for the easy, unintimidating can of artichoke hearts. But those people are missing out on the delicate flavor and toothsome-yet-creamy texture that only a fresh artichoke can provide.

Ingredients:

• 4 globe artichokes, or 10-12 baby artichokes
• Juice of 1/2 lemon
• 4 T dry breadcrumbs
• 2 T extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tsp fresh chopped parsley
• 1 tsp fresh chopped thyme
• 1 T vegetable oil
• 2 T capers
• 3 oz fresh chevre (goat cheese)

First comes the hard part – cleaning the artichokes. If you've never done it before, please refer to the extended version of this recipe, where I go into detail on the process.

Once your artichokes are clean and waiting their turn in the oven, mix together the breadcrumbs and the olive oil and season with salt and pepper to taste. Place in a small skillet and toast the breadcrumbs in your wood oven, stirring frequently, until they are golden brown and crispy. Remove and allow to cool, then stir in the parsley and thyme. Set aside.

Preheat a large sauté pan in your wood oven. You want a pretty hot oven for this preparation. Drain the artichokes, add the vegetable oil to your pan and then add the artichokes. Season with salt and pepper, then place in the oven and roast, stirring occasionally, until the artichokes are tender when pierced with a knife, about 10-12 minutes.

Squeeze the half lemon into the pan. Stir in the capers and then dot with the goat cheese. Return to the oven and cook for another 1-2 minutes until the cheese has started to melt into the artichokes. Remove from the oven, transfer to a serving dish and sprinkle with the breadcrumbs.

This dish would be a great accompaniment to lamb, or as part of an antipasti spread. Embrace the produce section's most intimidating resident, and enjoy!