Fellows in the second cohort have had several opportunities to meet in person. An early April 2024 trip to Kansas City included an education session with Nathan Whitaker and a visit to Te Sod Shop. Nine of the fellows participated in the TPI Study Tour to Italy. Several shared their photos and/or comments about that experience in the January/February 2025 issue of Turf News.


Tey met during the TPI 2025 International Education Conference & Field Day in San Antonio, Texas, where they were a dynamic presence, engaging with other attendees. You may have met a fellow assisting with the meet and greet at the registration area or helping sell football squares or raffle tickets to benefit Te Lawn Institute during the Super Bowl Tailgate Party. Tree fellows gave presentations during the “10 Innovative Ideas in 50 Minutes” education session (Haley Gavranovic Alford, David Acosta Marquez, and Henry Kerfoot). Fellows also provided a golf cart shuttle service, transporting Field Day attendees to and from the buses or parking area to the field, the lunch tent, the dinner tent, or anywhere around the site.


Now, as they navigate the second half of the program, this is the second of a three-article series sharing the stories of the participants.


Ben Storbeck


H & E Sod Nursery, Inc. Ben Storbeck says he doesn’t have a title at H & E Sod Nursery, Inc., though he calls himself a farmhand. Ben says, “I run tillage and harvesting equipment, work with the irrigation, apply pesticides, and I’m also involved in the logistics and delivery. We’re located in Momence, Illinois, and ship semi-loads into the Chicagoland area and Northwest Indiana. We also ship to multiple other states including North Carolina, Kentucky, and Texas, and are currently working on a big project in Ohio.”


When asked about his path to the turfgrass industry, Ben says, “I married into the business. When my wife, Emily, and I had been dating for a few years, her Dad, Darin Habenicht, President of the company, asked me to join the business. I was reluctant to and waited a few years before making that move. I’d been a suspension mechanic, working on big semis and dump trucks. It was a job, not a career. I joined the company in October of 2020, in the Covid-19 era. It was a new field for me; eye-opening, it’s so much more involved than just growing grass. It took a while to get familiar with the operations, but then I just blended in.”


H & E Sod Nursery, Inc. was established in 1947 with 15 acres of common bluegrass and one acre of sprigged C-15 bentgrass. Tey now grow 800 acres of sod and have a fleet of seven flatbed trucks and semis. Ben says, “Emily is the fourth generation, and our two-year-old


TPI Turf News July/August 2025 23


son, Sawyer, is the fifth generation. When he walks into the shop he immediately wants to get on the equipment and find the horn.”


Talking about the business with Darin and attending meetings with him sparked Ben’s desire to learn more. He took the Turfgrass Apprenticeship Program from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Ben says, “I wanted to keep learning, and the Future Leaders Fellowship Program offered that. It has surpassed everything I expected. Te connections you make with the people in the fellowship are excellent. Within six months, after the first meeting in Kansas City, we were connected, teaching each other, and learning so much more about the industry and leadership than any of us could have imagined.”


Ben’s one-on-one is Henry Kerfoot of Modern Turf. “Henry came to our farm last August,” says Ben. “I’m looking forward to going there this August. We run the same except completely different. Tey grow warm- season grasses, have hand-stack harvesters, and cut slabs. We grow seven different kinds of cool-season grasses, including five different varieties of bentgrass. We do have a hand-stacker along with two auto-stack harvesters and we cut rolls. We also harvest big rolls.”


Tose five Bentgrasses are Penncross 2.0, 007, 007 XL, Triple 7, and Crystal Blue Links. Tey also grow two Kentucky Bluegrasses: 365ss (from Mountain View Seeds) and XL200 (their proprietary blend); and two Turf Type Tall Fescues: Black Beauty (from Jonathan Green) and RTF (Rhizomatous Tall Fescue from Barenbrug). Ben adds,


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