Tag Archive for: The

Battery power from Toro for The Open

/in , /by

Battery power from Toro for The Open: The Open returns to Royal Liverpool Golf Club for the 13th time in July and helping prepare the course for the world’s golfing greats is Toro turfcare machinery.

While most of the machinery fleet at the famous links at Hoylake on the west coast of England is Toro, leading the charge on the greens, tees and surrounds are the Toro eFlex 1021 lithium-ion battery-powered pedestrian greensmowers and Greensmaster eTriFlex 3370 all-electric ride-on greensmowers.

Battery power from Toro for The Open

Battery power from Toro for The Open

A dedicated team of greenkeepers under the watchful eye of links manager James Bledge are making the final preparations to the course and Toro has been there every step of the way. In fact, the last time the club hosted the world’s oldest and most popular golf event in 2013, it had just taken delivery of six eFlex 1021 greensmowers and while plenty has changed since then, what’s stayed the same is the machine still entrusted to look after the greens and tees.

James explains: “We have a new par 3 which will be the biggest change since The Open was last hosted here – it is a very short but challenging hole with stunning views of the estuary and Wales. What hasn’t changed is the club’s commitment to sustainable course management in that we’re always looking for the best carbon-neutral options. And when you find a pedestrian greensmower that provides this level of precision and quality, powered by a battery, you don’t look anywhere else.

“The weather will dictate the greens speed for the week and the work we have done in the last year will ensure we have more control over this. For us that’s six teams of two out doing single and double cuts with the Toro eFlex 1021 pedestrian mowers.”

Joining the pedestrian mowers on the frontline is Toro’s Greensmaster eTriFlex 3370 all-electric ride-on greensmower. While this was the machine of choice for the greens at St Andrews at last year’s championship, at Royal Liverpool Golf Club it’s being used on the tees and surrounds.

James continues: “The eTriFlex 3370 is more than capable of achieving the standard required on the greens, as we saw so masterfully demonstrated at St Andrews last year. It is quite literally one of the best machines made and it’s a great greens choice, but with the acute run-offs on our course, hand cutting is the best bet.”

Despite the reliable machinery choices, that’s a lot of trust to put in the greens team to ensure a consistency of cut across the board for the eyes of the world surely. James agrees: “The greenkeepers are the heroes here. They’re the ones out there putting in the hours and miles; they are an extremely talented team.”

When James accepted the role of links manager in December 2021 the first thing on his to-do list was to prepare for The 151st Open and what could have been a baptism of fire for many was a dream role for James.

“I’ve been waiting for an opportunity like this,” he says. “Creating the most diverse volunteer team handpicked from all the best places, bringing together someone from every championship venue, having mentors from across the world to turn to and having the best brands and businesses to work with has been rewarding and will be an incredible opportunity for everyone involved. It’s great to see everyone come together with the common goal to put on the best event possible.”

Machinery dealer Cheshire Turf Machinery who has worked with Royal Liverpool for over 20 years and Toro’s UK distributor Reesink Turfcare will be providing extensive championship support and a fleet of Toro machines for the duration of the historic event.

Steve Halley, managing director of Cheshire Turf Machinery, says: “It really has been striking how enthusiastic and excited James and his team are about staging The Open. We are delighted to support their efforts to make the event as successful as possible.”

Jon Cole, divisional business manager at Reesink Turfcare, comments: “It’s a privilege to be a part of The 151st Open and supporting the team at Royal Liverpool throughout the Championship again. We have worked with at least 30 of the 40 host venues of The Open that have taken place in our 40 years as Toro distributor and to be involved is always an honour.”

For the latest industry news visit turfmatters.co.uk/news

Get all of the big headlines, pictures, opinions and videos on stories that matter to you.

Follow us on Twitter and Instagram for fun, fresh and engaging content.

You can also find us on Facebook for more of your must-see news, features, videos and pictures from Turf Matters.

Agrovista Amenity looks to the future

/in , /by

Agrovista Amenity looks to the future: Over 60 grounds professionals recently attended Agrovista Amenity’s The Future of Football Estate Management seminar, which was held at St George’s Park – the home of England’s national football teams.

Agrovista Amenity is committed to offering training and development and this insightful seminar focussed on the future of football estate management. Content included discussions on legislation, environmental pressures, fertiliser coating technology and nutrition, and ecology management.

Agrovista Amenity looks to the future

Agrovista Amenity looks to the future

The company joined forces with DLF, ICL, Campey Turf Care, and BASF to ensure the seminar programme featured a variety of expert speakers.

Andy Gray, Head of Grounds and Estates at St George’s Park, was delighted to host the seminar and stressed the importance of industry events: “Covid stopped events like this for a while, and it isn’t until they do stop that you realise how much you miss them,” he said.

“Throughout my career I have always found events such as these to be very beneficial – they are priceless in many ways.

“I’m very proud to show people what we have achieved in a small amount of time here. If one person takes just one thing away from what we do here at St George’s Park, then that is enough for me.”

Danny Stunt, Head of Grounds at Tonbridge School in Kent, was one of many delegates who benefitted from attending the seminar: “To visit St George’s Park was amazing and the event has given me something to aspire to. Not only that, but it has showed me how to get there. This has been the best place to come to help further my career.

“We are very invested in ecology and sustainability so to find out more about that was fantastic,” continued Danny. “I will be going away and introducing wildflowers to certain areas at the school, and I will be putting lots of things I have learnt today into practice.”

Joe Berry, Head Groundsman at Bristol City FC’s training ground, was particularly interested in finding out more about BASF’s Attraxor® plant growth regulator: “I am planning on using this product soon, so to see the presentation on that was very helpful. It has given me the confidence to go and use it during the grow-in period – which is what I was hoping to achieve by attending today.

“Events like this are very important to not only experience new products but also to speak to people in the industry and pick their brains about what they might be doing on their sites at different times of the year. The more we talk to one another the more we learn from one another.”

Pete Ashworth, Head Groundsman for Preston North End FC agreed: “It has been brilliant to come to this stunning venue to see old and new friends – it is great to share stories with one another and catch up. Sometimes you get stuck in a rut with products and other things, so it is good to get out and learn about new technologies. Going around the pitches at St George’s Park and seeing what Andy and the team do here has helped me to pick up a few new ideas.”

Reflecting on the seminar, Dan Hughes, Agrovista Amenity’s Head of Commercial, said: “It is really important for us to bring experts and expertise together. When you put professional turf managers together, they start sharing their problems and solutions; and at Agrovista, it is core to our ethos to facilitate that. I hope that today has inspired ideas to focus on, and the future challenges we will be presented with. I would like to extend a huge thank you to everyone that attended.”

For more information about Agrovista UK, visit www.agrovista.co.uk/amenity

For the latest industry news visit turfmatters.co.uk/news

Get all of the big headlines, pictures, opinions and videos on stories that matter to you.

Follow us on Twitter and Instagram for fun, fresh and engaging content.

You can also find us on Facebook for more of your must-see news, features, videos and pictures from Turf Matters.

Menai Tractors joins the Etesia family

/in , /by

Menai Tractors joins the Etesia family: Menai Tractors, based in North-West Wales, has been appointed as a new Etesia dealer and will be distributing Etesia’s complete product range which includes ride-on mowers, scarifiers, brush cutters, green technology and pedestrian mowers.

Founded by Robert Wyn Jones and his wife Gillian in 2007, Menai Tractors specialises in groundcare and agricultural machinery. Since its creation it has gained an excellent reputation for delivering a first-class service to its customers.

Menai Tractors joins the Etesia family

Menai Tractors joins the Etesia family

Robert believes that the Etesia brand is a strong addition to its extensive portfolio.

“Whenever I speak to someone who has previous experience of using Etesia machinery, they do not have one bad to say about them,” he said. “They are well built; the quality is second to none and I genuinely think the company is one step ahead of everyone else.

“I would point anyone who is interested in Etesia towards the reliability of the machinery and the quality of cut. It doesn’t matter how tall or wet the grass is – it goes straight through it every time.”

Specialists in manufacturing high quality grass cutting machinery for both the professional and domestic market, Etesia’s extensive range of products have been in consistent high demand for a number of years. It is for this reason that the company’s vast dealer network continues to grow. From the UK to Ireland, Etesia dealers are providing their customers with innovative solutions for their green space requirements.

“We’ve already sold a few of the Etesia ride-on mowers,” continued Rob. “I think the next 12-24 months are going to be very interesting. I have no doubt that the Etesia brand will be very popular with our customers, especially the local authorities. We deal with several caravan parks too and I think it will strike a chord with them too.”

For further information, please contact Etesia UK on 01295 680120 or visit www.etesia.co.uk.

For more news, reviews and insightful views, you can follow Etesia UK on Twitter @EtesiaUK and like the company’s Facebook page – www.facebook.com/EtesiaUK. You can also view the latest Etesia videos by visiting www.youtube.com/EtesiaUK.

For the latest industry news visit turfmatters.co.uk/news

Get all of the big headlines, pictures, opinions and videos on stories that matter to you.

Follow us on Twitter and Instagram for fun, fresh and engaging content.

You can also find us on Facebook for more of your must-see news, features, videos and pictures from Turf Matters.

Customer service at the heart of Reesink awards

/in , /by

Customer service at the heart of Reesink awards: Each year Reesink UK highlights its dealers who go above and beyond in providing exceptional standards of customer service, goals and considerations with its Aftermarket Dealer Awards.

Lee Rowbotham, service and training manager at Reesink UK, says: “The relationship between distributor and dealer is vital to the success of both businesses. In many cases Reesink’s dealers have that all-important customer facing contact. We appreciate how vital that role is and feel strongly about strengthening our relationship with our dealers wherever possible. That’s one of the reasons why the Aftermarket Dealer Awards came to fruition.”

Customer service at the heart of Reesink awards

Customer service at the heart of Reesink awards

The awards recognise an overall Dealer of the Year for Excellence in Customer Service, alongside outstanding performance in three key areas: Service, Parts and Skills. For the first time this year, Reesink also recognised its dealers that showed the greatest improvement across all key areas in a brand new award.

The new award is designed to reward dealers that showed the biggest step up across all sections of its KPI scoring: service, parts and skills with Devon Garden Machinery scooping this inaugural award.

Steve Dommet from the company says: “This award recognises the efforts our after sales team has put into raising standards and improving the service we provide our commercial customers. As this is a new award it was a pleasant surprise when we found out we’d won.”

Dealers are scored across all three key categories in keeping with Reesink’s Service Level Agreement. The dealer that achieves the highest combined score across categories is awarded the overall Dealer of the Year for Excellence in Customer Support. This year that award went to Reesink Turfcare South East who also won the gold award for Excellence in Skills. Tom Clark, branch manager of Reesink South East says, “Receiving these awards is a proud achievement and recognises our staff members doing a good job. It shows customers we’re a trusted brand as an award winner in what we do to be recognised as one of the best in the field.”

The runners up in these respective categories were Lloyd Limited and Oliver Landpower, who both took home silver awards.

When it came to Excellence in Parts, Revill Mowers took the gold award, with Gammies Groundcare taking silver. Stan Grewar, parts manager at Gammies Groundcare, says: “We’ve got a young team and this award reflects their hard work. I’m very proud of them, I know that the company and the parts department are in safe hands with them.”

Excellence in Service saw Cheshire Turf Machinery win gold while Redtech Machinery took silver.

Mark Woodward, service director at Cheshire Turf Machinery claims: “We are continually investing in our customer service and the excellence in service award is our eighth award since 2017. All of our staff have been brilliant in maintaining and improving standards since the Reesink service level agreement was introduced.

“I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate one of our service technicians, Chris Hester. He’s our first technician to successfully complete the prestigious Toro Master Tech course.”

Lee concludes: “Reesink has always prided itself on delivering fantastic after sales service and the Aftermarket Dealer Awards recognise those dealers who do an exceptional job at upholding this customer service standard. We’d like to thank them all for their continued hard work and incredible work ethic, it’s a real pleasure working with them year in and year out.”

To learn more about Reesink’s aftermarket offerings including genuine parts, machinery servicing and maintenance advice, customers can get in touch with their local Toro Genuine Parts dealer or service centre or contact Reesink via reesinkturfcare.co.uk.

For the latest industry news visit turfmatters.co.uk/news

Get all of the big headlines, pictures, opinions and videos on stories that matter to you.

Follow us on Twitter and Instagram for fun, fresh and engaging content.

You can also find us on Facebook for more of your must-see news, features, videos and pictures from Turf Matters.

It’s TinyLineMarkers® at the double for PGSD!

/in , /by

It’s TinyLineMarkers® at the double for PGSD!: Recent rapid expansions have seen major investments for Hounslow-based contractors PGSD – the most recent of which is a second TinyLineMarker® from Origin Amenity Solutions (OAS).

So impressed with the accuracy and labour savings brought about by their original TinyLineMarker® Pro, a Pro X has joined the fleet to deliver efficient marking to schools and sports turf customers across the home counties.

It’s TinyLineMarkers® at the double for PGSD!

It’s TinyLineMarkers® at the double for PGSD!

“Due to the growth in business, we were finding that marking surfaces manually was becoming problematic in terms of both time and labour” explains Managing Director Mark Hooley. “Sports facilities and schools tend to work to extremely tight changeover timeframes and so, to meet requirements, we looked to technology to help.” Mark and the team researched the market extensively and found the TLM Pro to be extremely effective during trials. “We wanted something that was straight forward to operate and that would give us the precision we need when installing these lines. The TLM Pro met all of our requirements, and upon delivery in the spring of 2022, proved to be absolutely outstanding!”

The TLM Pro was shared between teams based in London and Hertfordshire before being joined by a new TinyLineMarker® Pro X in April 2023, giving the two PGSD schools’ teams their own marker for an even more efficient service. “Our operatives were blown away by the intuitiveness of the Pro but the Pro X is next level!” exclaims Mark. “The tablet has been upgraded and there are even more settings and stored markings – all easier to find and use. There is also a wealth of new features, simple things like the ability to manually flush out the system after marking which is a great addition.”

Robust and versatile, the TLM Pro X is the new fast and effective solution to marking – offering a 10L paint capacity and high traction, pro wheels making it suited to even the most demanding field painting jobs.

“Our two TLM’s have been out most days as we prepare sports grounds for the summer season. With the software, we can programme and mark out a 400m running track in 90 minutes compared to two operators spending a full day using string and tape measures… and getting even better accuracy! Once summer marking is complete, we’ll then have another busy season come August when we start putting down markings for football and rugby.”

“We’re delivering a superior product to our clients with these markers and, when combined with the simplicity of use and labour savings, makes the investment essentially cost-neutral.” Mark adds, “There is also plenty of support from Simon Hughes at OAS who has helped us at every stage of the process, including delivering all the initial training, and though we’ve not needed to call on him we know help is available at the end of the phone if we need it.”

Free demonstrations are being offered across the UK.  To book or enquire visit https://tinymobilerobots.com/tinymobilerobots-uk/

For the latest industry news visit turfmatters.co.uk/news

Get all of the big headlines, pictures, opinions and videos on stories that matter to you.

Follow us on Twitter and Instagram for fun, fresh and engaging content.

You can also find us on Facebook for more of your must-see news, features, videos and pictures from Turf Matters.