Bay Area Fireplace

We had a gas insert installed and our brick fireplace refaced with tile.
The tile was installed poorly. The tile is not level making the mantle look like its out of level. We are going to have to hire a carpenter to work some magic to make things look right. If you plan to reface your fireplace, I’d suggest you hire your own tile installer.
Hash came out a couple of times to remeasure, assess the job, then just sent his crew. Installed with one piece that was too small and had to wait for a replacement part. Would have thought with the multiple trips to measure, the right parts would have been ordered to start with.

I ordered a fire place insert/​door with Larry. Let me tell you, AVOID him at all cost! The finished product was great but there is no customer service at this place. We placed the order and was told the turn around time was any where from 6 – 8 weeks. OK, no problem but then it began.
I gave measurements to Larry and requested for him to call me back that week if there was an issue for the measurements so I could adjust the tile for my fire place if needed. I did not hear from Larry so figured everything was going smoothly. I decided to call him the following week to make sure everything was good but was told by Larry he put a hold on the order because he didn’t hear from me. wth?
I never gave him the authority to hold the order and he decided to take it upon himself to hold this order which backed it up another week for production. Our initial conversation was never for me to call him, he was to call me if there was an issue. Now my order is held up for another week, well it is a good thing I was checking up on it otherwise I would have waited 6 weeks and assumed my fire insert would be ready for pick up.
I told him I wanted to expedite the order since the order never should have been on hold. He stated he would call on Monday since it was a weekend when I spoke with him. Monday, no call, Tuesday I call him but the gentlemen tells me that Larry is out of the office but would leave a message for him to call me back. Larry never called back. I call again the following day and he tells me he could not get a hold of the vendor but left a message. I called again on Thursday but still no call from the vendor. I googled the vendor they were using and spoke with a rep from the company and they stated the measurements were not standard so they could not make the fire insert I wanted. Simple! I was able to contact the vendor within a quick phone call so not sure what took Larry so long.
It took almost 2.5 months for my finished product. I was so frustrated with this whole process and the lack of communication with Larry. I will never go back to this company or so I thought I would not. I pick up my product, bring it home and a piece is missing. OMG!!! I had to call Larry back and luckily the pieces were found at the store so I had to drive back to pick it up.
I think this was the guy upstairs testing my patience.
The product is good but they need an over haul with employment.

Oh, wow, our experience here was SO bad. The reason for one star is that we love the product, but, honestly, the service was AWFUL. The person who took our order would rather be watching a football game that was on. He did not know his product, telling us what we wanted wasn’t available, until we made him ask someone else to see, and it was. Someone to come measure was mandatory and we were charged for that AND it took 2 weeks to have that happen. Order was held up until after that. You can’t schedule installation until the product has ARRIVED. Another two week delay. They never called us ONCE to let us know about delivery or scheduling; I think we called to check in 4 – 5 times. The installer won’t let you finish a sentence or ask a question — super interruptive. We would not recommend this place, nor would we return.

Finally Hash you did fix it, it was a long and unpleasant journey, but thanks Hash you finally fix it.

I bought a fireplace insert from Bay Area Fireplace two years ago. It looks great and was working well until we wanted to use it during the cold snap last December. The pilot would not light. I called and received no response to our request for a service call. I then called the owner, Hash, directly and he said there was no chance anyone could come out to fix our fireplace for several weeks because it was the busy time of the year. He did agree to Facetime with us as we spent an agonizing hour struggling to do the repair ourselves with his instruction. I was told that my unit would need to be serviced every year and that I should call in the summer which is their slow season.
At the end of the winter the pilot light went out again. I called in the summer as suggested and left a message for Hash without response.
Conclusion: Bay Area fireplace is happy to sell you a product but when it breaks their customer service is awful.

They have always provided quality work and products, from the actual build /​installation through all the regular maintenance service appointments.
Also, easy to work with and accomodate the customer’s requests.

I want to give «no» star if I can to this place. I’m about to remodel my house by building addition to living room so my designer told me to shop for fire place. Since I live so close to Bay Area fireplace, I was determined to give my business by supporting to my local/​neighborhood businesses. It was a very hot day yesterday 8÷15÷2015, when I walked into the show room, the sale person «Bred Carpenter» said to me that did you walked in here because of really hot outside or you’re actually looking to buy something? What an insulting statement! But I ignored him and continue to talk to him regarding the fire place that I was looking for and the cost. He pointed to me some of the fireplaces that cost over 10K and over 6K. I told him these were out of my price range my budget was around 2K-​3K and do you have something lower price? He said «you came into Mercedes dealership and asking for cheap car and we don’t sell it you are in wrong place». He constantly talked down to me serval time when I asked for lower price items. Right after he gave me the quote, he did not want to answer any of my questions and basically stop the conversation by ignoring me. I was about to walk out of this place but I realized that I had spent so much time looked for parking because I was on my way home and decided to stop by there that I want to accomplished why I came here for so that I can tell my designer the type and the size of fireplace she need to put in her design. Please note that my review was not about the price or service of this place. This place may have reasonable price with good quality stuffs but I will never find out because of this one sale person Bret Carpenter. The type of Fireplace he quoted me was $ 4843.91.
Folks! There are more than one Fireplace stores in bay area stores that will treat respectfully to all their customers or potential customers. Don’t even go to this place. I don’t know if you are certain race and dress very expensive you might impressed this type of sale person and you will be treated respectfully! I don’t know? Before I go there I was determined to buy the fireplace from this place because I can walk to this store from my house. I walked pass by every weekend when I walk my dogs and thinking if I remodel I need to come here. OMG until I met this sale guy Bred Carpenter, I don’t ever go near this place ever again. Stay away !!!

Earlier this spring I bought a «fix-​up» older condo. It had a 1980’s small container fireplace with a gold and black facing & doors that were in need of repair. I was referred to Bay Area Fireplace by the company that cleaned out the old fireplace. They were great! A gentleman named Bret showed a brochure with several facing styles with different décor and colors. I picked one and put down a deposit of total cost. Another guy, Alex, came out to to mu place to measure old fireplace dimensions. They put in the order, which took about 4 weeks. As soon as it came to store, Alex called and arrange a time for the install — which took about an hour. It’s beautiful and I am very satisfied. With new paint and touch-up’s like the new facing, my Fix-​up home feels new and clean. See photos — will upload old and new fireplace.

Its been 2 months since we placed our order and there is no reponse from them. We called them a couple of weeks back and they asked us to wait a week. No calls from them yet. Not sure why making a custom fireplace door should take this long.

This review is long overdue. We converted our wood fireplace to gas last year and after getting multiple quotes, decided to work with Hash. The work included knocking down a wall, tearing down our old brick fireplace, centering and rebuilding the new fireplace. Hash and his crew were professional, finished the job pretty much on time, and cleaned up after themselves. Hash was on-​site with the crew and ensured that everything went smoothly. We love our new fireplace and enjoy it everyday.

We purchased a top of the line unit from Bay Area Fireplace late last year around November. As a general contractor managing our clients’ jobsite, we helped them choose out a model which complimented the remodel. We had worked with BAFP in the past and were pleased with the results.
Customer service was fantastic. Our emails and calls were replied to from 24 – 48 hours. Any inquiries regarding installation and specs were answered in a professional manner.
Unfortunately one of the light bulbs in the fireplace went out shortly after installation. When I called their office, I was told that they were flooded with service calls due to the holiday season. I was told that they had approximately 200 service calls for their single technician.
No problem. I understand how hectic the holiday season can be. Thank you for letting me know.
Three months later, its February. My weekly calls requesting a technician for our simple visit was met with the same cookie-​cutter response from multiple employees (at least put forth some effort and come up with a new excuse). We’re flooded. 200 calls. 1 technician. We’ll get back to you. (remember, all we need is to have a light bulb swapped out)
Their office gave me the personal cell phone of the technician whom was advised to call and text. No reply. It would appear as though the mindset every person in this company is not to solve customer concerns but rather to push them onto another’s plate. As a consumer, you are yanked on a merry-​go-​round of broken promises and unanswered calls. The diffusion of responsibility at this company is appalling.
They never got back to me. I always had to call and ask about the status of my client’s job. The technician was able to swap out the light bulb towards the end of Februrary. Yay! Except for the fact that the bulb went out 3 days after installation.
Cue the process over again. Empty promises, cold calls, excuses. It is now May. I received contact for the first time from the technician last week in order to schedule another service date for the light bulb. The first thing he says to me over the phone is that my contact number was incorrect in the system which is why he took so long to get back to me. I have recordings of all the voice mails we left. I have images of the text messages that went unanswered to his cell. I have our original invoice with our correct office number. I allow him to continue insulting me with his excuses. I bite my tongue in order to hold back the profanity laced tirade building within. At this point I am tired. Tired of everything. I ask him to come out as soon as possible and end the conversation on a neutral tone.
Today, may 13^th is the day of the appointment. The technician did not show up at the agreed upon time of 11am-​12pm. I call him at 12:30 and leave a message. I get a call back from him saying hes running late. Wow! I really appreciate the courtesy call. Im sure my client also appreciates moving her schedule around to accommodate the service call and have it run late. He says that he is on the way. Calls me back 10 minutes later asking for job address. Now Im on Unilocal.
My client ordered her fireplace and had it installed in December. It has been 6 months. Half a year. To change a light bulb. Im starting to feel like this is a joke! How many Bay Area Fireplace technicians does it take to change a light bulb? Only one. But its gonna take six months, 10 hours of work resources, and an increase to your blood pressure by 20 points.
As a general contractor, this has been extremely embarrassing and damaging to our reputation. We had to consider filing a complaint to the license board. We are nice people. It pains us to even have to consider this option. It is ridiculous that we were even put in this position in the first place.
In the interest of fairness I did not overlook their positives out of spite.
1 star — Sales staff was knowledgeable
1 star — Initially customer service was great… up until they received our final payment. Quick 180 after that.
All in all, I would avoid this company like the plague. If you have ever had customer service issues with Comcast, imagine these people as the Comcast of fireplaces. Yeah. Yikes.

Great service and they kept on top of our order! We placed an order through our contractor in November, well we thought he placed it at that time. Instead he didn’t order it till late December, which put us behind! Joe and Carlos did everything they could to speed up the process and get things to us as quickly as possible! If it wasn’t for them we wouldn’t of gotten what we wanted. Also, I called back to order a liner that gets placed in the fireplace to reflect the flames, they got it to me 2 weeks early!!! Thanks so much guys, we will for sure use you in the future again!!!

I wish I had a better experience here but it was destined to failure from the start. I don’t know why at the time I did not put my initial meeting with the company as a no go.
Right now my PGE bill has gone up $ 100 because the system is always open to the outside. When windy outside you can feel the cold air coming out of the vents that you cannot close. Thus, I pretty much stuck with living with the inefficiency of the system or just shutting it down completely.
I should have been aware at the get go when the salesman took my order without seeing my house and fireplace. We have large natural stone rocks which make it pretty hard to put in a door. After waiting 6 weeks for the order to come in the installers go out to install and guess what, since they did not see it before, they were having major problems.
After I ordered they did send a person out, Hash, to view that what needed to be done and he, unfortunately he was not the person that came out to do the work. The two workers that did come out were totally lost and the work they did had to be taken out. I could tell that the two workers were upset with how it was looking.
Hash seems like the only person there that knows what they are doing. Hash had to build another support for the door to make it work. Hash is very knowledgable and tries hard to please his customers.
The unit I have has a pilot light running all the time which I was told was necessary if I wanted a unit that would start without a remote. Friends of ours got an insert from another company that has no pilot light but starts without the remote. Also, Bay Area Fireplace told me I cannot run the unit with the doors shut– I was told this not by the salesperson but by the installer after it was installed– it will melt the plastic parts in the fireplace. Yes, you got it– plastic parts in a hot fireplace.
I think I found part of the problem with big holes under the fireplace door, that look like they should be sealed up on the inside of the door. I’ll be back after I find out if this works.
But, I am still stuck with a leaky fireplace that is horribly inefficient.
You might want to look someplace else for a new fireplace insert.

At the moment I’m waiting for Hash, the owner, to call me back between customer calls. The owner does onsite customer calls? Hmmm. Great! I called last week saying the unit (a $ 3500 insert) all of the sudden would not turn on. They said someone will call «next week» (that’s this week now). No one called as of this morning (Wednesday of this week) so I started to be concerned (it’s cold outside) so I called back. The guy said maybe in a couple weeks someone can come out because they are swamped. OK. No. It’s cold weather and it’s the busiest season, but no. I’m not going to wait that long. I expressed my concern (polite pissed off-​ness) and I was directed to Hash, who was on the job doing service calls. He tried to help me fix it on the phone but I wanted to find the user’s guide and then I would text him, which I did. He called almost immediately and tried to walk me through the process. Granted, I am capable of taking the unit apart but only with instructions. So per his instructions, I took off the «surround», which surrounds the insert (easy), and then the glass (easy) and he guided me to the point where we fixed it. My time was worth the wait of a service call. It took 10 minutes. I do say that they should hire a couple technicians to reduce the service backlog. But who needs fireplace service in the summer? These guys are busy during this time of year. I guess you would have to hire seasonal employees with experience in fireplaces.
The end result is that although I would have had to wait another week to get a fix, the OWNER called me between his OWN service calls and guided me through the procedure. Where can you find that? I realize that some people would not be able to do the instructions, and for them, yes, it would be frustrating. But unlike some people giving 1 – 3 stars, I find the showroom is not dirty, the displays are very modern (why would they show old products). Most of the low ratings are very lame.
Just my 2 cents.

This update is an answer to Hash G. comments.
I had paid Bay Area Fireplace exactly $ 139 for the trip to come at my place to give a diagnostic, which was to replace «the pilot assembly.» The repair man had left with the reference and serial number of my fireplace, as well as my check.
After that, nobody from Bay Area Fireplace did the follow up to give me the price of the parts to be replaced and/​or the price of the repair although I had called the shop several times.
Yes, several months after this mishap, when I used another company to repair my fireplace, I paid 100% of the parts before they did the repair and did not have any problem with paying the parts upfront.
It is okay to misplace a client’s file or to have an unreliable repair man, but since you had cashed my check, you should have sent another person to do the diagnostic again and give me a price, or tell me that you cannot do the repair.

We had our gas fireplace replaced 2 years ago at the recommendation of my brother who had his wood burning fireplace replaced with a gas insert the year before by Hash. We were very happy with his professional service, and friendly recommendation, not to mention the quality of his works. He was never pushy when we were selecting the styles and materials. He even gave us suggestions for places to check out for bargain for the stone tiles, and even went to pick them up for us.
I called him recently when I couldn’t turn it on for the first time this season. It turns out that the batteries for the transmitter for the remote need to be replaced. We didn’t have to replace them last year as the manual suggested because the remote worked so well and we totally forgot about it. Hash immediately knew what the problem was and guided us on the phone patiently to find the transmitter located beneath, and the problem was solved effortlessly. Hash is great. Highly recommend.

Love it, love it! It is the only reason to look forward to cold weather. Also, service is terrific.

BUYER BEWARE! Avoid this establishment. I should have known when every Google review gave this place 1 star and most their Unilocal ones agree. The showroom pics online aren’t real. It looks like they set up the showroom 15 years ago and it is pathetic. Unorganized and dirty. This should be your first sign to exit the building. We were greeted by a nice salesperson who offers u a drink or snack from the café they own next door and then it goes downhill fast.
After explaining our situation we decided on a fireplace as we were told we really only had one or maybe two options. We did like what we saw in the catalog but of course it wasn’t in their showroom as the showroom fireplaces look ancient.
We got a price and were told the next step is someone would come out next week and do an inspection to insure we would be OK for install of this unit and the gas and chimney functions would work too. We left thinking great. They come out and we get the OK and then we place an order.
The following week when we talked to the installation contact he said they don’t come out and do site visits and sent us a contractor guide telling us how we need to prep everything for demo. When we brought up the gas connection and chimney issues he ignored them confirming they will only come out for demo and install.
When we told him we weren’t comfortable with that approach he told us we could take some pictures and send to him but it got to the point of being ridiculous as we aren’t handy and didn’t expect to do this type of work. The detail he wanted really required a visit. We are literally about 4 miles from their store.
In the end we just gave up on them and called a very helpful and service oriented provider in Santa Cruz who is insuring we get the service we need to update our fireplace
I assume this place might survive by dealing with contractors and wholesaling fireplaces to them so they just move product and don’t really deal with installation or service.
If you are simply a homeowner looking at fireplaces their showroom is a total joke and if u still try to decide to have them help u put a fireplace in your home they will underwhelm you with their poor service.
There have to be plenty of better options in the area. Save yourself the pain.

The bf and I had high hopes for this place but were severely disappointed.
Upon entering, we weren’t greeted. We walked around the crowded space, which was disorganized and not too busy. Each of the sales people were with customers, so I could see that they were in the middle of working. It doesn’t take a lot to excuse yourself and greet customers entering the store.
For a place that specializes in something, you would think that they would have fireplaces that were super impressive. We sat down for about less than five minutes but decided to leave for these reasons. The older gentleman that entered before we left was greeted and told that he would be helped as soon as they were available. If only that was the greeting that we received. I’m not going into what I believe were the reasons that we were ignored, but that should never even happen. Congratulations, you could’ve taken some of my money but since you’re so rude, I’ll give it to a business that is willing to work for it.

I can’t remember the last time I worked with a company who went as far as Bay Area Fireplace did in making sure my husband I were happy with the product we purchased from them. And there are not many businesses who are willing to make an exchange for a customer when the customer was totally at fault.
I won’t go into all of the details here but the bottom line is that it was my fault for choosing the wrong type of insert for the ambiance/​heat output that we wanted. Dr. Hash and his team lived up to their end of the deal by delivering and expertly installing exactly what we ordered. A few weeks into it, I realized I bought the wrong type of unit. I contacted Dr. Hash and fully expected him to tell me there was nothing he could do for me. To my surprise he sent his team out to remove the unit and install a different type of unit more suited to what we wanted.
I am totally in LOVE with my fireplace now! It is the focal point of our home and I’m so happy Dr. Hash and his team at Bay Area Fireplace took such good care of us.