Fire Chief Fred Tetterton is proud of his volunteers. The 20-year veteran of Pinetown Volunteer Fire Department makes no bones about it: without volunteers, his job would be a lot harder — especially when there are 1,200 people to feed Saturday.

Saturday, Pinetown VFD hosts its annual fall barbecue fundraiser and if the past is anything to go by, folks better get there early, according to Tetterton. Barbecue, chicken and combo plates — with plenty of sides to accompany the main dish — will be sold for a donation to the department. The fundraiser brings in roughly $13,000 every year, all of which is used for everyday support of the station and its volunteers: purchasing equipment, maintaining equipment, paying insurance and workers comp.

Tetterton’s not sure how long the department has been doing the barbecue fundraiser, but he knows for certain that it took off once the volunteer firefighters became volunteer pig cookers.

“We got a lot better response, once we started cooking the pigs ourselves rather than buying the barbecue,” Tetterton said, adding that most of the food and supplies are purchased locally.

A small army of volunteers are required to pull off cooking and serving that much food, in addition to selling the homemade desserts baked by more volunteers. Earlier this week, teams were preparing for the big event. This afternoon, the pigs will go on the cookers and another crew will keep the coals going overnight. Come Saturday morning, yet more volunteers will oversee the grilling of hundreds of chickens — then there are those who make the potatoes, slaw and hushpuppies by the thousands.

It all adds up in manhours and money to help support the facility that comes to the call in case of emergency.

“Without these fundraisers, it would make it so much harder to keep the doors open,” Tetterton said.

But Tetterton said each year Pinetown VFD hosts the barbecue dinner, the support the squad gets from the community is just as important as the donations pouring in.

“It gives me a sense of pride knowing the community backs us the way they do, to see the community is behind us 100 percent,” Tetterton said. “It makes what we do that much more rewarding, that we’ve touched people’s lives and had a positive impact on them.”

Tetterton said barbecue sales may start at 11 a.m., but they’ll only last until the food runs out. His words of advice: “Come early and come hungry.”

Pinetown Volunteer Fire Department is located at 7262 N. Boyd Road, Pinetown.