How to get a woodburning stove to Italy...?

I have always, always, wanted a wood burning stove, and I hope that it will be my main source of heating (with the central heating being used just as back up).

My builder said that he would be able to fit the stove for me IF I could get it to him before he put the roof on. I had seen a stove I liked on a website and they delivered to Italy for £250...so it seemed doable. The reason I wanted a stove from the UK is because they are all quite modern looking in Italy (and expensive) and I wanted traditional (and cheap!).

I asked my dad to call the company to ask about the stove and what accompanying flue bits we needs, but the lady was..how shall we say...customer servicely challenged that day?!

Dad explained which stove he would like, then enquired if they sold twin wall flues (as we could only see single wall ones on the website), she abruptly said we needed to go to a shop that sold flues (okaaayy...I thought we had?). Anyway..undettered my dad then asked if they sold the chimney part ..and she replied 'I am too tired for this'.

Ummm...

She then repeats ' I am too tired to be talking about chimneys on a Friday afternoon'.

And that was that. I thought at first that this might be an employee that was leaving that day or something, but turns out it's the womans own company! Me thinks someone might need a little retraining in how to deal with customers who are about to buy something from you!!

So..I decided I didn't want to buy from the mad woman incase she was too tired to actually send out the stove or something, so I resorted to trusty old ebay and found this stove for £220.

(His name is Stevie stove) :-D



So now it was only the small issue of how to get a 93kg stove and 40kg worth of flue bits to Italy. Luckily I found someone via an expat forum was heading to Italy with space in his van the following week. And double luckily..he only lives 10 miles from me in England and a few miles away from where the stove needed to be delivered to at the other end!

All packaged and ready to go..



The stove will wait patiently at my project managers house until it is ready to go into the cabin. Hopefully next time I post a picture of Stevie he will be up and running and burning merrily!