By Diane Smith

Record-Courier staff writer

EDINBURG -- Generations ago, families huddled around a wood burning stove to keep warm in the winter.

These days, with fuel costs soaring, many homeowners are returning to the wood-burning stove as an environmentally friendly, cost-effective solution to paying hundreds of dollars a month for fuel oil or propane.

Pettigrew Feed & Hardware, at the corner of S.R. 14 and Tallmadge Road, is Ohio's largest dealer of furnaces that burn wood pellets, corn or even cherry pits. The store has sold many of the units to people in other states, who order the stoves on the Internet.

"We've been doing this long enough that we're starting to get referrals from people," said Fred McKenzie, sales manager at the store. "People are hearing about it from their friends that have bought them. And they work."

Most of the units burn about a 40 pound bag of wood pellets daily in the winter, McKenzie said. The bags of pellets sell for $4 each at the Edinburg hardware store, meaning most wood stove owners can heat their homes for about $120 a month.

Most people who heat their homes with fuel oil or propane spend much more, he said.

"I had a guy come in here the other day who said he just got fuel oil delivered for $800, and in the winter, he said he'll have to do it twice a month," he said. "He ended up buying one of these."

Many of the units are made to sit in an upstairs room, and some are made to be inserted into an existing fireplace. Several can be put right next to a wall. They plug into a regular outlet to run the blower fan, which uses less than $4 a month in electricity, and are vented outdoors through an exterior wall. No chimney is required.

The units vary in size depending on the size of the home being heated, but most will heat up to 2,000 square feet. A small floor fan or ceiling fan usually is enough to distribute heat to other rooms of the house, though some units are similar to traditional furnaces and are made to hook up to existing duct work.

Several of the units run on alternative fuels such as wood shavings, corn, wheat or even cherry pits, though the pellets -- made from wood shavings -- are the cheapest and most popular fuel source.

Unlike outdoor wood burners, which are being targeted for regulation by the Ohio EPA, the units are EPA approved. The clean-burning fuel source does not contribute to global warming.

Lonnie Pettigrew, owner of the store, said a potential buyer from Fairbanks, Alaska has contacted the store. Many of the people who buy the units are on the East coast and are seeking an alternative to energy costs that are even higher than they are in Ohio.

"The pellets cost $400 a ton on the east coast, and they're $200 a ton here," Pettigrew said. "We sell over 1,000 tons of pellets a year from here."

McKenzie said many people are already thinking ahead to winter and are choosing to buy their units now. More than 30 people are waiting for installers from Pettigrew to install their units, while others are able to do the job themselves. Some suppliers of the units are out of stock, meaning some units might not be available this winter after the burners in stock are sold.

The units cost $1,500 to $3,500, plus installation costs. Most people report that the units pay for themselves within two or three years, though McKenzie speculated that with soaring fuel costs this year, the payoff could be more immediate for customers.

The store advertises in the Record-Courier, on the radio and on the Internet, but most of the business has come from word of mouth, McKenzie said. They include McKenzie's brother and his mother, who both have installed the wood burners in their homes.

"It's a good product, and they'll come back" he said.