Te group gathered for a photo op during an Evergreen Turf managers meeting.

varieties. Some are specific to one market segment; others are shared across all markets. Te current list includes: Latitude 36, Midiron, MiniVerde, TifEagle, Tifgreen 328, TifGrand, TIFTUF, Tifway 419, Aloha Paspalum, Palmetto St. Augustine, Celebration, Tall Fescue, and Bluegrass.

Fox says, “We like to be on the leading edge with the best turfgrass varieties. But we do try to test a new variety for a few years to make sure it performs well in our conditions before we introduce it to our customers.”

Family Ties Jimmy Fox doesn’t completely immerse himself in Evergreen Turf. He has a getaway spot in the home he shares with his wife Lora in Apache Junction, Arizona. It’s a place filled with faith, love and laughter—and usually at least one or two of their seven grandkids.

Fox says, “When Lora and I married, one of our goals was that once we started having kids she’d become a stay-at-home mom to raise them. We didn’t anticipate that she’d get pregnant six months after we married, but we made it work and are both so glad we did. I thought she’d be looking forward to restarting a career now that all three of our kids are married with kids of their own. But she came up with an even better idea. She’s now a stay-at-home grandma—and she loves it.”

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Jimmy and Lora are living every grandparents dream; with their entire family not only nearby, but also so close knit they see all of them almost every week. “Our kids were into sports growing up and we went to all their events. Now we’re getting to do that again with the grandkids,” says Fox.

Teir son Josh runs Evergreen Turf ’s installations in Arizona, serving as project manager. He is married to Andrea and they have two girls, Paisley and Cheylynn.

Teir oldest daughter Shannon is a stay-at-home mom who plays and coaches volleyball and does photography. She and her husband TJ are the parents of two girls, Tylee and Tru, and a boy, Taze.

Teir middle daughter Nikki is a professional seamstress who designs and sews upholstery for an outdoor furniture company and also does photography. She and husband Sean have a boy, Tanin and a girl, Kynlee.

And, great grandpa and grandma live next door. Fox says, “After all four sons were on their own, my Dad and Mom went back overseas for another 15 years, preaching and teaching in Tailand, Laos, Cambodia and Burma/Myanmar. Tey love being so close to us now, but they’ll always be missionaries. Tey still go back overseas two or three times a year to work with their churches.”

Promoting

Natural Grass Fox sees the growth in youth soccer as a great thing, especially because soccer hates playing on plastic surfaces (synthetic turf). “People who want to play on natural grass are some of our best advocates,” he says. “Soccer players don’t like sliding on synthetics and they love NOT eating the crumb rubber. A synthetic turf field is no fun at face level.”

An upcoming project gives Evergreen Turf another opportunity to put the spotlight on natural grass. “We’ll be using Latitude 36 for the professional soccer team Los Angeles Football Club in their new stadium in Los Angeles and their practice facility,” Fox says.

Tey also will be sodding all the fields for a ten-field complex in El Paso later this summer. Tat will take about 25 acres of Tifway 419. Tey’ll be renovating several football fields in Phoenix, two in conjunction with the Arizona Cardinals. And they recently harvested the first sprigs from their TIFTUF field in California— another new grass for them.

Evergreen Turf is sharing news of these projects and the benefits of natural grass by Facebook and Twitter, an outreach to those who receive most of their information via social media— soccer moms and millennials. And the mission continues.

Suz Trusty is co-editor of Turf News.

All photos courtesy Evergreen Turf / Jimmy Fox.

TPI Turf News July/August 2017