George Foreman Grill - By George, It's a TKO!

Retired, overweight boxers never fade away, they sell the rights to their name on kitchen appliances for $137.8 million dollars. Seems like a lot for appliance manufacturer Salton to shell out, but the name George Foreman has proven to pack a mean marketing punch.

On January 13, 2000, Salton, Inc. bought the George Foreman name in perpetuity for marketing kitchen appliances. The total deal was worth $137.8 million dollars to Mr. Foreman - $23.8 million dollars in stock, and $22.8 million in cash paid each year, for five years.

Amusing side note: George Foreman, of grill fame, is not by any stretch the only George Foreman, even in his own house. Foreman has named each of his five sons "George Foreman" as well. One wonders if he will be cutting them in on the deal, given it was their name he sold as well.

You gotta have hustle

If you saw any of the infomercials featuring George (the senior) hawking the George Foreman Lean Mean Fat Reducing Machine, you might think that he was instrumental in creating it. Nope, George didn't get in the ring until well after the third or fourth round.

Salton was producing the same grill (more or less) in 1996, before Mr. Foreman became the spokesman and placed his name on the product. In 1996 (without George) Salton sold 200,000 grills. In 1999, (with George) they sold more than eight million grills. Old George has a way of bringing the people into the arena now, the same way he did when he was a showman athlete.

You gotta have muscle

Once you bring the people into the arena, you had better give them a good show. The boxing world has seen disappointing match after disappointing match in recent years. All promotion, and no show. Viewers who shelled out $40.00 for pay-per-view matches got bouts lasting less than 60 seconds. Hardly a good value for the money, leaving hordes of dissatisfied customers.

Salton and Mr. Foreman don't have that problem here. The George Foreman Lean Mean Fat Reducing Machine leaves no one disappointed. College students, "single-guys", newlyweds, families and senior citizens all rave about this very simple product. Check out other reviews on Epinions to see all of the different sorts of people who are pleased. Once George gets their attention, the grill keeps them happy.

The product basics

Unless you've been living under a rock, you are most likely familiar with the product basics. Chances are you've heard George pitch them over, and over again.

o The grill has channels and a downward slope so that all of the fat and liquid drains off of what's being cooked and into a separate drip tray (included)
o The cooking plates have a non-stick coating, making clean up easy
o There's no on/off switch, but there is a "ready" light which is thermostat controlled, similar to a waffle iron
o The G10 model has an 8" x 8" cooking surface
o Plastic spatula for use with the grill is included


The writer buys her own George Foreman Lean Mean Fat Reducing Machine G10

I was one of the last on the block to buy the George Foreman grill. I've never bought anything on an infomercial before, although I've been tempted. A big fan of watching them, there is just some stumbling block to my actually calling the number. I didn’t buy the Victoria Jackson cosmetics, the Ron Popiel Beef Jerky Maker, or the vacuum sealer food keeper machine whose name I can't currently remember. Deep down I believe that the better they make the product look on TV, the worse it will be when it arrives at my door. The George Foreman grill looked way too good.

Having heard good things about the product repeatedly, I caved when uBid.com put the smallest version up for a bid of $21.00. That didn't seem like too much to risk on a product that had the infomercial stigma.

The writer uses her George Foreman Lean Mean Fat Reducing Machine

I mean, I use it. Nearly every day I use it. Sometimes twice a day I use it. This is not a "seemed like a good idea at the time" appliance. (I have crepe makers, salad shooters, and pore cleansing machines for that category.) This is a appliance that is as useful as my coffee maker or my microwave.

I use it to make hamburgers, hot dogs, grilled cheese sandwiches, grilled chicken, grilled shrimp, pork roll sandwiches, tuna melts, grilled vegetables, cheese steak sandwiches… I really could go on, but you get the idea.

Food is far tastier on the grill than in a pan on top of the stove. It's visually more appealing too, because the grill leaves professional looking grill marks on everything you cook.

Preparing food is far easier with the Foreman grill than using an outside grill and I swear that I can't taste the difference.

Yep, it's a TKO

TKO, in boxing lingo, stands for "technical knock out" and that is indeed what this grill is. No doubt a "bout" it. It is designed so simply, but so well that I've got to wonder where it has been all my life.

o food cooks fast
o food looks great
o grill cleans up quickly (if you wipe it when it's warm)
o looks nice on counter top but also stores easily

Not to tell George what to do, but…

I have a couple of quibbles, the first with myself.

o I should never have bought so small a model. I need to buy the family size, GR30 model which goes for about $100.

o Next quibble - this appliance should have an on/off switch. I don't like having to plug and unplug it all the time.

o Final quibble - the cover gets awfully warm, making me nervous with children around.

George Foreman will go the distance

Call your bookie and put your hard-earned money on this tip: George Foreman will go the distance in the introduction of some new Salton products.

Here's what bears his name now:

12 different grill pans for the stove top
4 different models of the Lean Mean Fat Reducing Machine
2 large party size grill machines
1 rotisserie

Guess what's coming up? An outdoor grill! Which ironically, is what many of the current grill machine fans are avoiding. After the outstanding marketing success of this product, I'm telling you, put your money on George to win. Salton sure did.


Update 12.22.02

I was less than happy to see that my review of the GR10 had been merged in with the reviews of another 5 different Foreman grill models. Not quite sure why Epinions chose to mush them all together. If you check "view details" for this product, you'll see the listing covers the following models:

GR10 • GR10A • GR10ABW • GR10ABWO • GR10ABWT • GR10AWHT

My Foreman grill does not have the bunwarmer pictured at the top of this review, so I can't comment on whether that's a valuable feature or a waste of money. I'm sorry about that. I considered pulling this review entirely, but after consulting with the PTB, was assured that it's indeed in the right spot.

Such as it is.