Who makes their own arroz con pollo — chicken and rice — from scratch when they're in high school? Dan Gertsacov ’93 did. 

“When I was on the football team, we had a potluck, and I was so interested even back then in cooking that I brought my signature dish, which I had stumbled on cooking for my mom,” Dan said. “Cooking and exploring food in my teenage years sent me on a trajectory of thinking I wanted to be a chef.” 

He never became one — at least not officially. Dan earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Richmond, then had a choice: accept a Fulbright Scholarship or head to Thailand for culinary school. He became a Fulbright Scholar but a year later would get to Thailand for culinary school, in the end finding out that being a chef was not what he wanted. What he desired was to experience culture through food. That, he said, would become his hobby. 

“So for the past 27 years I have been traveling with a goal to learn 50 cuisines,” Dan said.   

This year he will hit that number in Taiwan as part of a business trip for Big Green Egg, where he is the chief executive officer of the 51-year-old company that makes the iconic outdoor ceramic grill. He recently launched a project on YouTube, The Road to 50 Cuisines.  

Dan’s resume is as diverse as the many cuisines he has sampled: he has worked for venture capital-backed startups and nonprofits. He has worked at Google. He has worked for McDonalds’s largest independent franchisee. He has worked for Focus Brands, now GoTo Brands, which owns such chains as Cinnabon and Auntie Anne’s pretzels. Before joining Big Green Egg, Dan was senior advisor at McKinsey and Company, focusing on digital transformation and the future of food and restaurants. All the while, he figured out ways to merge his hobby with his job, extending business trips and using vacation and holiday time to experience new cuisines, whether through formal, cooking-school settings or by simply working with a local, like the grandmother he encountered in Italy, or through other experiences. 

Dan lists his top five food experiences from his travels as making paella in Valencia, Spain; a stewed pork dish in Yucatan, Mexico; “the perfect hummus” in Lebanon; mapo tofu in Chindu County, China; and coconut soup with lemongrass in Thailand. 

He places importance on making time for one’s passion and finding ways to blend work and leisure life when possible. He also understands why culinary experiences attract him. “The food is great, always, but it is connecting and bonding with others through food, learning culture through food, that motivates me,” he said. 

Ed Fisher founded Big Green Egg in Atlanta in 1974, when he began importing the kamado-style ceramic grill. These green machines can be near and dear to someone’s heart, evidenced by these lines in three people’s obituaries: 

“Later in life he became a member of a group that loved to cook on the Big Green Egg and called themselves Eggheads.” 

“[He] loved to barbeque with his Big Green Egg, so much so that he gifted each of his children with one.” 

 “He took great pride in perfecting his craft on his Big Green Egg, always eager to share a meal with family and friends.” 

As Dan says, someone might have “300 words to talk about their loved one and three of those words are Big Green Egg ... So, we have a strong following, a fan base, a cult-like following.” 

Devotees of the green-dimpled cooker are known, as one of the obits says, as Eggheads, and the headquarters in Atlanta are a must-stop for them and others. There’s a retail store complete with grilling accessories, clothing, signs, even Mr. EGGhead, a plush toy. There is a culinary center, even a small museum area with various kamado-style grills from years ago and a video about the company’s history. This year also marks the 29th anniversary of a signature event — Eggtoberfest in October.  

“It started with five people, and now there are 5,000 people who get together at a minor league baseball park, and they cook for each other. We put the eggs out, they show up with the food,” Dan said. The event is akin to a big family picnic. Big Green Egg bills itself as a company that connects family, friends, and neighbors.  

Big Green Egg is launching its first brand campaign, with the slogan “If you cook over fire, they will come.” The campaign video opens with these words: “Strange things happen when you cook over fire. Family members suddenly emerge from their dwellings. Newcomers arrive with offerings of peace and goodwill. Laughter erupts ...” 

Dan assumed the CEO role in April 2024. Although Big Green Egg already has a “cult-like” following, there is room for growth. The products are not sold in big-box stores, and there is no plan to begin doing so, he said. 

“The easy path to making more money would be to open it up to the big boxes and Amazon, but to do that we would be leaving at the altar the groom who took us here, not only the Ace Hardwares of the world but pool stores, local butchers,” Dan said. “We get sold in a lot of paces, 500 locations around the U.S., so that is part of the legacy.” 

Dan is trying to build on that legacy.  

“We have been slow to adapt to all the competition that has emerged, where people have options for four kinds of pizza ovens and three different kinds of electric grills and five kinds of pellets, and griddles, and all these things that didn't exist even 10 or 15 years ago,” he said.  

Dan said Big Green Egg is the third most recognized brand in what is about a $12 billion industry in the United States, but its market share does not reflect this level of brand familiarity. Thus, the company has launched its brand campaign. Dan also said the company is focused on product innovation and ease of use.  

“People say, ‘[the Big Green Egg] is amazing, but I don’t have time [to cook out].’” he sad. “We’ll make it easier to cook for family and friends at home.” 

There are many competitors on the market, such as Weber, many of which use propane gas, and Traeger, with its wood pellets. Dan noted that there also is competition in another form — all those places that deliver meals to your doorstep. 

“People think they can’t cook or grill at home,” he said. “’It won’t come out as good. ... We don’t have time to cook at home.’ So we’re just trying to make the tent of the Big Green Egg bigger to stick more people under it.” 

Dan said his time at Loomis Chaffee gave him “the environment to explore my whole self.” He came from a public high school in Rhode Island as a sophomore and said that playing III football that first fall under the coaching of Bill Eaton started him on his way. He left as a varsity letter winner in three sports — football, wrestling, and track and field, the latter gaining him a scholarship to the University of Richmond. He said being a student representative carried over to college, when he was student rep to the trustees.   

Jim Wilson, known as Grim, was his economics teacher and independent study advisor. 

“My sophomore year I did an independent study on trying to make volunteerism tax deductible,” Dan said. “Time is money. You can give money; why can’t you give time? Grim said, ‘That’s an interesting idea,’ so I did an independent study to try to change the tax code. I went down to Washington as a 15-year-old and realized maybe Washington is where good ideas go to die. But that gave me the idea that business could be part of the solution.”  

Eggtoberfest might bring the Eggheads together, but it also brings joy to others. The net proceeds will go to the Atlanta Food Bank this year, Dan said, citing the benefit project as “an example of a company standing by what it means to be a purpose-driven company, sort of what my Fulbright was on.”      

Dan explained that his thesis for his Fulbright explored “enlightened capitalism and doing well by doing good. Is there a role for business to play in society bigger than just making money? ... How do you use profit for some larger purpose than just making money?” 

Big Green Egg, he said, eventually will be operated by the Fisher Foundation, making it a non-profit. “So, the profits we make will be reinvested in local communities around food,” Dan said. “And that is this model of regenerative capitalism. I’m trying to practice what I preach.” 

He said Big Green Egg is a big brand but a small business. “And what I am here to do is to grow it in a way that’s consistent with its values,” he said, “so that it is a bigger business, or more equivalent to the size of its brand, but in a way that reinvests in the people that work here, reinvests in the community where it operates and so it has, hopefully, a positive impact on the environment in which we operate. So that is the goal.”