WCAX.COM Local Vermont News, Weather and Sports-Summer is coming... Right?

Burlington, Vermont - January 29, 2010

If you really squint, through all the wind-whipped snow, you can see the waves of Lake Champlain. Thursday's fast-moving squall had Reporter Jack Thurston desperate for good news from Mike Van Buren.

Thurston: So you promise me that summer is coming?

Van Buren: I sure hope so!

Van Buren is the designer of "The Beach Fire." It's a pretty simple device, welded together and assembled in a business incubator space in South Burlington. A yachting-style tote bag holds a sturdy metal ring and tube that connect to a propane tank.

He buries the unit in beach sand, then lights a fire and turns on the gas. Viola! A fire for those summer parties.

"It can last 3-4 hours," Van Buren said.

Thurston: Can you roast marshmallows on this?

Van Buren: Absolutely!

Thurston: Just not in January?

Van Buren: Probably not right now!

Van Buren graduated from UVM with a mechanical engineering degree and worked for years in the fireplace industry, both for a trade association as in home heating design, which is still is primary job.

"Business was a little slow, and we had some time," he explained.

So he started tinkering on a way to help a favorite nonprofit-- the Haunted Forest. The group wanted an easy way to start bonfires used in its annual Halloween skits. Van Buren created a propane rig to make it quick for the volunteers to operate outside.

"So I decided to take the idea and make it into a product," he said.

The $180 Beach Fire was born just last year and has already been attracting customers in coastal communities, even getting picked up by a few big hearth and fireplace retailers.

"These burners are nice and clean. Once you're done burning, you can take them out of the sand, and there's no mess left," Van Buren said.

Thurston: It's working though, despite the snow squall!

Van Buren: Despite the 40 mile per-hour-wind, it's staying lit.

Mike Van Buren will spend this winter preparing stock for what he hopes is a busy Spring and Summer of customers planning their beach outings.

Thurston: I'll come see you in July, I think.

Van Buren: Let's do that. I'd like that a lot!

A season with better weather to enjoy his creation that's Made in Vermont.

"My hope is I can keep manufacturing here!" Van Buren said.

Click here for more on how to order The Beach Fire.

Jack Thurston - WCAX News