Contributor Spotlight: Matt Bradley

Matt never planned to work in the hearth industry. But after a wide range of roles in food service, plywood production, and public education, he eventually found his way into the hearth world through a part-time role with Tim Reed in 2020. At the time, Matt was teaching high school English in Sisters, Oregon, and he and his wife, Emily, had just welcomed their first son into the world. When Emily decided to leave her career as a kindergarten teacher to stay home with their newborn, Matt knew that he needed to make ends meet. So he started working on small projects for Tim before school started and after his family went to bed. But that side work eventually turned into something more.

“At first, Tim would send me email campaigns to edit or project proposals to review,” Matt explained. “Eventually, I started doing small data projects—updating price lists, install numbers, and product info in the WhyFire system.” As the company grew, Matt stepped in to help with customer support and operations. By 2021, WhyFire had grown enough that he came on full-time as the company’s partnership manager.

Today, Matt sells WhyFire to new partners and works closely with them afterward—building their platforms, leading team member training sessions, and fixing things when they break. “Tim taught me that sales is a form of service if you’re solving people’s problems,” Matt said. “That mindset helped me make the leap from teaching into this industry.” He’s also the editor of The Fire Time Magazine, where his background as a teacher and love of reading and writing continue to shape his work.

When asked what advice he would give newcomers to the hearth industry, Matt shared two bits of wisdom. First, show up with gratitude. “The hearth industry is full of small, family-run businesses—some three or four generations deep,” he said. “It’s a privilege to be part of an industry like that—especially if you didn’t originally help build it.” His second piece of advice: Don’t worry if you don’t know everything right away. “It’s a complicated industry—which is why I’m still learning new things about it every day—and it takes a ton of time to learn. So just focus on honing your craft and serving people well. The rest will come in time.”

Outside of work, Matt’s life centers on faith and family. He lives in Central Oregon with his wife, Emily, and their three children—Adam (6), Isaiah (4), and Hannah (3). Most summer weekends, you’ll find them camping at one of the Cascade Mountain lakes nearby. In the fall, he follows Oregon State Beavers football with a crazy amount of passion. In the spring, it’s all Beavers baseball. Throughout the year, he works out regularly and reads widely—from articles in The Fire Time Magazine to issues of Evangelization & Culture to canonical literature by Dickens, O’Connor, and others. Most importantly, he goes to Mass with his family every week—something he considers the center of his life.

As a regular contributor to The Fire Time Magazine, Matt sees writing as a way to serve the industry and share what he’s learning. “This magazine encourages me to keep thinking about language and life while working in a completely different field,” he said. “I love that.”