Windmill Village Hotel, Golf & Leisure Club in the West Midlands has invested £250,000 in brand new Toro machinery.

And true to the saying ‘grist for the mill’, the machines are helping the club succeed in a new seven-year machinery replacement deal.

The historic 18-hole parkland course has had a windmill on site since the 1500s and was turned into a coaching inn 300 years ago, with an original well and drinking trough still to be found on site.

But course manager Chris Curley was looking to the future when considering a new fleet deal for the Coventry club – with Toro the brand that impressed the most.

“We switched exclusively to Toro seven years ago because it seemed the best at the time,” Chris recalls. “But when we came to renew I compared Toro against one of its main competitors, wondering how much the other make had moved along in terms of technology and developments. But Toro had moved much further forwards. You can’t compare greens and fairways machines on a like-for-like basis – the Greensmaster TriFlex 3400 riding greensmower and Reelmaster 5610 fairway we’ve since bought are just incomparable.”

Chris also counts a Reelmaster 3100-D Sidewinder fairway mower, a Groundsmaster 4500-D rough mower, one Workman MDX-D utility vehicle and two Workman HDX-Ds, plus a Workman-mounted 200-gallon sprayer among his new arrivals, with these models being straight replacements for his previous fleet.

But new additions include a GreensPro 1200 greens roller and a ProForce debris blower. “I’d been using the vibrating rollers on our greens machine, but wanted an iron to apply Primo Maxx treatments and cut down on my mowing,” Chris continues. “We now mow the greens every other day since using the iron. And the blower is just a fantastic bit of kit.”

Chris says that the club – which is part of the Best Western hotel group – chose to stick with Toro machinery because of its reliability. “I’ve never had any problems with our Toro machines because they’ve always been maintained properly. So ultimately I thought why change just for change’s sake to something perhaps less efficient.”

The service Chris receives was also a clincher. “The service I get makes me feel like I’m the only customer my service centre has got. They’re so efficient and helpful. Good maintenance is worth its weight in gold – it’s half the battle in this job!”