Common Questions About Fireplaces, Stoves & Service

It depends on the unit, the venting, and the finish work, which is why we put live pricing in the online estimator instead of making you call for it. Answer a few questions about your space and you'll have a real number in about a minute: the unit, the venting it needs, and professional installation, with no obligation.

It's a real ballpark, built from the unit's actual price and the typical installation for your configuration. The free in-home appointment turns it into a firm quote once we've seen the wall, the chimney, or the gas line. Nothing is ordered until you've seen the final number.

We sell and install gas, wood, and electric fireplaces, inserts, and stoves from Heat & Glo, Heatilator, Kozy Heat, Fireplace Xtrordinair, Lopi, Napoleon, Jotul, Hearthstone, Vermont Castings, Quadra-Fire, Blaze King, Amantii, Ambiance, Dimplex, and SimpliFire. Every unit we sell is on the website with an instant installed price, and the showroom has displays you can see in person.

A fireplace builds into a wall (a blank wall or new construction). An insert slides into the masonry fireplace you already have and seals it. A stove stands on its own and heats a zone or the whole house. Pick your situation on the home page and the estimator shows you what fits.

It depends on the unit, the venting, and any finish work. Inserts and freestanding stoves are the quickest; built-in fireplaces with framing, a gas line, or finish carpentry take longer. The in-home appointment sets the schedule before anything is ordered.

Fall is the busy season, so the earlier you start the estimate, the better your odds of a fire before the first real snow. Spring and summer installs book quickest of all.

Chimneys hide problems, clearances surprise people, and every house vents a little differently. The appointment is free, and it confirms the venting and the fit so the number holds and the installation goes in once. We provide one before every installation.

Our own people. SnowBelt uses in-house installers who are licensed to run gas lines, and our technicians are factory-trained. The shop that helps you choose the unit is the shop that installs it and services it afterward.

Please do. The showroom at 1200 Wildwood Dr in Stevens Point is open Monday through Friday, 9 to 6, and Saturday, 9 to 1. Our team will help you find the perfect fireplace and get an estimate for your project, whenever the project is.

Many gas fireplaces and inserts light with a standing pilot or a battery backup for the ignition, so the flame keeps going when the grid doesn't. The blower needs electricity, so you'll get radiant heat without the fan. Ask which ignition your unit uses at the in-home appointment.

The difference is in the log detail, the ember bed, and the flame path. Builder-grade units burn a thin ribbon of flame behind the glass, while better units layer taller flames through detailed ceramic logs over a glowing ember bed. That's why we keep displays on the showroom floor—you judge a flame from three feet away, not from a spec sheet.

In most masonry fireplaces, a gas insert does exactly that: it slides into the firebox, seals it, and runs a liner up the existing chimney. The in-home appointment confirms the opening, the chimney, and where the gas line lands.

Done right, it disappears into it. Surrounds and trim kits size the insert to the opening, so the brick and the mantel stay the heroes. The change your guests notice is that the room is finally warm.

Once a year, ideally before the first cold night. Dust, pet hair, and spiders love a pilot assembly, and a small drift in gas pressure or a tired thermocouple turns into a no-start in December. The annual visit catches all of it.

Check the wall switch and the breaker first. After that, don't keep cycling it. Note what it does—clicks, sparks, or nothing at all—and tell us when you request service. Knowing the symptom saves you a second visit.

Most of the time, the room decides. A fireplace builds into a wall and anchors the room's design. A stove stands on its own out in the room and can go where framing a chase doesn't make sense, which is why it wins in three-season rooms, additions, and cabins.

We do. SnowBelt's in-house installers are licensed to run gas lines, so the same crew sets the unit, runs the line, and lights the first fire. No second contractor to schedule.

An open masonry fireplace pulls more warm air up the chimney than it gives back. An insert plugs that hole with a sealed, efficient firebox and a lined flue, so the heat lands in the room. Sized right, it can carry the main floor through a Wisconsin winter.

You need a sealed stove sized to the room, dry wood, and a loading habit: load it full, burn hot for a short while, then damp it down. The right unit holds coals until morning. The wrong-size unit never will, which is why the sizing conversation matters more than the brand.

Burn seasoned hardwood that has been split and dried for a year or more. Wet wood burns cool, smokes, and coats the flue. If the ends are cracked and two pieces sound hollow when you knock them together, the wood is ready.

Close the door on a strip of paper. If it slides out without tearing, the door isn't sealing, which means the fire burns fast, hot, and wasteful. A gasket is inexpensive and turns the same armload of wood back into an overnight burn.

A wood insert needs a flexible stainless liner sized to the insert, run up the existing chimney. We spec it at the in-home appointment so the install passes inspection and the insert drafts the way it should.

Wood stoves and gas fireplaces can operate without a problem when the power's out. A wood stove or wood insert needs nothing but the wood; a gas unit with a standing pilot or battery ignition keeps its flame, minus the blower. Electric fireplaces need the grid, so they're the one fuel that doesn't help in an outage.

An electric fireplace is a space heater with a flame effect: a built-in heater warms a bedroom or a den as zone heat. It's not a furnace, and it needs the power on, so for whole-house or outage heat a gas or wood unit is the better pick. For a room that could never vent a real fire, it's the only pick.

An electric insert makes no combustion, so it needs no liner, flue, or fresh-air kit, and the old chimney can stay as it is, capped or open. What it does need is a dedicated outlet within reach of the cord, which most masonry fireplaces don't have yet, so plan for that line item.

That's where most of them end up. The flame is light and the heat vents from the front or the bottom on most models, so the wall above stays cool. The unit's own manual gives the clearance, and we check it before the install.

A matchlight log set lights with a match, so the flame doesn't care whether the power is on. A set with electronic ignition or a remote needs a battery or an outlet for the ignition. Either way, the fire is there when the grid isn't.

Clean them gently, with the gas off and the logs cool: use a soft brush for the logs, a vacuum for the ember bed, and nothing wet. If the flame pattern has changed or the logs look shifted, leave them where they are and request service. Log placement is what keeps a set burning safely.

Choose gas logs if the look of an open fire is the point. A vented set burns with the damper open, like a wood fire, and most of the heat goes up the chimney. Choose a gas insert if heat is the point. It seals the fireplace and warms the room. The estimator prices both so you can compare.

We do, and plenty of them. Gas, wood, and electric fireplaces, inserts, and stoves, plus gas log sets. Plenty of the people who buy a fireplace from us met us on a service call first.

Click Request Service anywhere on the site. It opens one short form: pick the repair, tell us what's going on, and send it. Our team will call you to set the day and time of the service appointment, so nothing is on the calendar until you've talked to us.

Request it in late summer or early fall, before the first burn. Fall is the busy season, and off-season visits are the quickest to set.

We do. We sell and install outdoor-rated wood and gas fireplaces from Hearth & Home Technologies, Napoleon, and Amantii, planned for Wisconsin's freeze and thaw and installed with their own clearances and venting.

It needs its own set: the gas supply, the clearances to the structure, and the wind around the venting. An outdoor fireplace is a real appliance, which is why it outlasts a portable fire bowl, and why we look at the site before you order.

Yes. The units we carry are outdoor-rated and built to live outside year-round. Follow the manufacturer's guidance on covering it for the off-season, and it's ready the first warm evening in April.

Within about 70 miles of the Stevens Point showroom: Portage, Wood, Marathon, Waupaca, and Waushara Counties and the counties around them, from Wisconsin Rapids and Marshfield to Wausau, Waupaca, and Wautoma. Not sure you're inside the ring? Ask.

The estimate prices the unit, the venting, and the installation the same way everywhere we work, and the in-home appointment is free before every installation. What changes with distance is scheduling, and we tell you that honestly when you book.

Yes. Every page's showroom section carries a Google virtual tour of the floor, and the home page does too. The displays are better in person, but the tour tells you what's waiting before you drive in.