By Heather Posey, Staff Writer
From the golf course to the back yard, artificial landscape company YourTurf claims to bring its professional sports turf into every neighborhood’s home field.
In the blaze of summer and the increased labor of watering, cleaning and fertilizing grass to keep it from losing its luster, more and more homeowners are trading in their lawnmowers for easy-to-care-for artificial grass. And YourTurf, housed in Newport Beach, dominates the industry with its durable, long-lasting product known as FieldTurf.
Engineered and designed more than 20 years ago, FieldTurf is the largest manufacturer of grass in the world. And with 35 different patents protecting it and a 68-percent market share against 30 other manufacturers of synthetic grass, it was an obvious choice for YourTurf when their business opened four years ago.
“FieldTurf is the Lexus of landscaping, I don’t care how you slice it or dice it,” said Shannon Beck, vice president of business development. “So for us wanting to get into this business, FieldTurf was a natural selection and they had a territory open in Orange, Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties which we are [now] the distributors for.”
And with more than 700 installations made over the last three years in Los Angeles and Orange County alone, YourTurf has transitioned the high-quality professional grass from the sports arena to the home by appealing not only to the homeowner but also the pet owner demographic.
“I guarantee!when they engineered and designed and invented this product, they weren’t thinking ‘oh, wouldn’t it be great for dogs to play on it?’ They really invent this for fields,” said Beck. “They made it durable and strong enough for pro athletes to play on it.”
FieldTurf is a blend of polyethylene and polypropylene, silica sand and Nike Grind that gives years of grass-like appearance and use without the regular maintenance requirement of natural grass. Installation of the product includes layers of road base and decomposed granite that facilitate stability and drainage, FieldTurf’s patent polyethylene and polypropylene blades tuffed into a permeable geotextile mat and an infill of sand and cryogenic rubber.
“The cryogenic creates more weight density so the rubber won’t float up when water gets on it, and it won’t come off on your skin,” said Beck. “And none of the other competitors can get cryogenic rubber because it’s a patent that FieldTurf holds.”
Another thing that sets YourTurf apart from the competition other than its patent infill is its permeable backing and pre-paid warranty.
“All of our competitors punch holes in the back of their grass, so one percent of their grass is drainable,” said Beck. “Forty percent of our surface area on our grass is drainable!and FieldTurf is the only company that pre-pays the warranty to a third-party insurance company at the time of purchase so you don’t lose out. All other turf companies carry their own papers, but if you were to call them and they weren’t there, you would have no warranty.”
And with FieldTurf in eight NFL football stadiums, three major-league baseball stadiums, animal hospitals, dog grooming shops, humane societies and pet boarding facilities, FieldTurf has become a staple in the sports industry as well as FieldTurf by YourTurf in county fairs, pet shows and home and garden conventions.
For more information on FieldTurf and YourTurf, call (800) 613-TURF or visit www.yourturf.com.
