I’m John and I’ve been the guy behind Meat Smoking Calculator since 2012.

Back then I was splitting my time between the occasion BBQ competition and business consulting, and I kept watching people (myself included) do the same napkin math before every cook: it’s a 14-pound brisket, we eat at 6, the stall will steal two hours, so when do I light the pit?

I build software for a living, so I did what builders do. I turned the napkin into a calculator.

That’s been my career in a nutshell, honestly. For more than two decades I’ve built software, marketing systems, and analytics platforms for companies large and small. The thread running through all of it is the same one running through this site: take something people stress about, do the hard math behind the scenes, and hand them a plan they can trust. It turns out planning a brisket and planning a product launch use the same muscles. One of them just smells a lot better.

Recently I tore the site down and rebuilt it from scratch, because a calculator was never the whole idea. The best things I’ve ever learned about BBQ came from people who had no reason to help me and did anyway. So now you can plan your cook to the minute, save your methods in My Pit, share them, and rate what works. We are the BBQ army. Be as helpful, caring, and generous as you can afford to be.

When I’m not shipping software or tending a fire, I’m usually cooking for my family, who have eaten more “experimental” pork butt than any humans reasonably should.

Happy Smoking!