Congratulations to the Educhem Bandits

On Friday the 16^th of September over 100 growers and suppliers attended the first Grower2Grower golf day. Marie and I would like to thank everyone that attended and made the day a tremendous success full of fun and laughter. It has been a tough few years for everyone in the industry so to be able to host this event and have such a fantastic turnout was amazing.

Without our fantastic sponsors this event would not have been able to go ahead.

A special thanks goes out to the Horticentre Group who were the Major Sponsor of the day. Their support of growing community events is very much appreciated. It was great to have so many of the Horticentre team attend. Marie and I would like to personally thank Horticentre’s Group Manager, Brendan van Diepen for his guidance and support.

The welcome breakfast, sponsored by Flexi Tanks, was brilliant, a perfect time for all the teams to catch up. Thanks to Andre for cooking the breakfast and to all the Flexi Tank team for their support. The chip the ball into the tank was a great challenge on hole number 10.

During the golf, the players were well refreshed thanks to our on-course refreshment sponsor Rothbury Insurance. Apparently one of the delivery carts with the snacks was preferred although I heard the drivers of that cart were a little slow in getting around.

It was so good to see everyone enjoying themselves on the golf course, with several of the hole sponsors having a short activity at the tee box this added to the fun of the day. Thanks to Gellert’s for their amazing putt the marshmallow game that saw lots of golfers take home beautiful house plants. Well done to Vena Ulae for guessing the correct number of Ecomix coir chips in the jar. Roelf Schreuder from NZG Waiuku won the Franklin Law raffle and well done to Kristy Blacklaws for winning the Flexi Tank chipping prize. Tarryn Collie guessed the correct number of Zonda Bees in the hive. Thanks to all

Thanks to the sponsors:
Horticentre Group (Major Sponsor) https://horticentre.co.nz/
Flexi Tanks (Welcome Breakfast Sponsor) https://www.flexitanksnz.com/
Rothbury Insurance (On course Refreshment Sponsor) https://www.rothbury.co.nz/

The hole sponsors:
Gellert Nurseries https://www.gellerts.co.nz/vegetable-propagation
Ecomix https://www.ecomix.com.au/
ANZ https://www.anz.co.nz/banking-with-anz/
Franklin Law https://www.franklinlaw.co.nz/
Educhem https://educhem.co.nz/
Zonda Bees https://www.zonda.net.nz/
Punchbowl https://www.punchbowl.co.nz/
SPS (South Pacific Seeds) https://www.spsnz.com/

Well done to the competition winners, The Bandits from Educhem. Grant Beare, from Educhem, also won the men’s longest drive competition. Second overall was the Chep Blasters and coming in third place on the day were the Potato Diggers from Wilcox. We would like to acknowledge and apologise to Team Hothouse after it was pointed out an error on countback meant they missed being announced as coming third. Kristy Blackwell, from Team Hothouse was also the winner of the women’s longest drive competition.

• First place – The Bandits (Educhem)
• Second place – Chep Blasters (Chep)
• Third Equal – Team NZ Hothouse and the Potato Diggers (Wilcox)

 Well done to the Educhem Bandits for winning the competition on the day.

• Longest Drive Women – Kristy Blackwell – Team NZ Hothouse
• Longest Drive Men – Grant Beare – The Bandits (Educhem)
• Closest to the Pin – Janine Grul – Team Lefroy (Lefroy Valley)

We hope to see you all back next year.  Thanks to Craig Smith and the Pukekohe Golf Club for all of their efforts.

Thanks, from the Grower2Grower Team on the day

Marie, Stefan, Tarryn, Ray and Barry

Please see photo gallery below