photo by Sarah A. Miller/Tyler Morning Telegraph Greg Crenshaw of Top Hat Chimney Sweeps cleans a client's chimney Friday Dec. 19, 2014 in Tyler. Crenshaw and fellow owner Robert Graham are firefighters who started this business as a job to do on their days off from the fire station.

Robert Graham and Greg Crenshaw have been working feverishly to clean Tyler’s chimneys for the arrival of Santa Claus.

The Tyler firefighters started Top Hat Chimney Sweeps in October and have since been busy taking calls and cleaning chimneys throughout East Texas.

“I thought we’d get busy enough just to break even our first year,” Graham said of the business. “We’ve far exceeded that. … We’re almost to the point where we can’t handle it.”

Toni Hibbs, of Tyler, called Top Hat Chimney Sweeps before Thanksgiving and discovered Friday morning was the quickest they could clean her chimney.

“I thought, go with the fireman,” she said. “They’re so nice.”

Ms. Hibbs said when the weather is cool she starts a fire every morning.

“I love a fire. I think it’s homey, comfortable and pretty,” she said. “I like to hear the snap, crackle, pop of the real wood.”

Crenshaw, 30, said both children and adults have asked if they are cleaning the chimneys to make way for Santa.

“That’s what we tell the kids,” he added.

Graham, 41, who has been a firefighter for 14 years and Crenshaw, who has been a firefighter for seven years, have cleaned about 100 chimneys since placing a small advertisement in the newspaper in October.

Since they work 24 hours on at the fire department, followed by 48 hours off, most firefighters have a second job, Graham said.

“This is just something we both talked about doing,” he said. “We felt that chimney sweeping would be a natural fit.”

Keeping chimneys clean is important to prevent house fires. When creosote, the black dust, builds up in a chimney over time, it can cause a fire in the house’s walls, attic or roof, he said.

“We have a couple of chimney fires every year,” Graham said.

A lot of homeowners don’t think about needing to clean their chimney and only call chimney sweepers when they see a problem, he said.

Graham and Crenshaw recommend having a chimney swept every year, or for every one cord of wood that is burned.

Ms. Hibbs has lived in her house since 1990 and has never had her chimney cleaned. She knew it was getting bad when dust began dropping all over her when she opened the damper and when it started to smell, she said.

Watching Crenshaw and Graham clean her 32-foot tall chimney, she said, “I think it’s most interesting.”

Crenshaw and Graham use new “power sweeping” technology to clean the chimneys. A brush with bristles similar to thick WeedEater cord is attached to a rod and a drill. The rods are extended as the brush goes up the chimneys, and the drill spins the rod and brush. As the dust and debris come flying down, they vacuum up the mess.

“This is a pretty dirty job,” Crenshaw said. “We take every precaution to keep the customer’s house clean.

Crenshaw, of Fairfield, helped his stepfather clean chimneys when he was younger and said the new way of doing things is much more efficient.

Traditionally, a different kind of brush is used to clean the chimneys manually from the top down. The new technology gets the chimneys cleaner, quicker and allows them to clean from the inside of the house instead of from the roof, he said.

“Some roofs like this one are really steep and really dangerous, so if you don’t have to, why get on it,” Graham said.

They clean every part of the inside of the chimney, including the smoke shelf. Positioned behind the damper plate, it is hard to get to, and Graham believes some of the ones they have done had never been cleaned before by other chimney sweepers. He has found old mortar and bird’s nests there, he added.

Chimneys can range from 16 foot to 40 foot. Most of the jobs require both of them, but sometimes they work alone to get more jobs completed.

They don’t only clean chimneys in Tyler. They have had jobs in Henderson, Rusk, New London, Lindale and Mineola.

Crenshaw grew up in Flower Mound and followed in the footsteps of his stepdad, uncle and cousin, who were all firefighters. He worked in Palestine for two years before going to work in Tyler, he added.

Graham, who grew up in Wolfe City, had friends who were firefighters and thought it would be a good career.

“I was inspired to do it,” he said.

Graham, 41, also has a pool cleaning and maintenance business and came up with the idea for Top Hat Chimney Sweeps.

“I always get ideas in my head and I jump into the deep end with them, and when I look up, I have three jobs,” he said, adding that he has three daughters who all compete on dance teams, which gets expensive.

Since starting Top Hat, they have cleaned about five chimneys a day when they’re not fighting fires for the city of Tyler. They believe they have enough work to keep them busy this season through January or February but will keep sweeping chimneys until the calls quit coming.

“It literally blew up,” Crenshaw said of the business.

Next year, they plan to start earlier and be even busier, increasing their business by four or five times and have more crews of firefighters cleaning chimneys, Graham said.

Crenshaw said they have had a few firefighters asking to get in on the business.