Friends Reunited: Jimmy Kidd Joins The Great Turf Company

Jimmy Kidd has joined The Great Turf Company as Global Development Director in support of the team's unique 'Activated Microbial' approach to turf management. This appointment marks the reunion of Jimmy with two of his previous colleagues and lifetime friends, Ian Macmillan and Ian Morrison.

With 51 years experience in the turf care industry worldwide, including the prestigious post of Director of Golf Courses and Estate at Gleneagles where he prepared courses for 17 championships, Jimmy has become a prime figure within the greenkeeping community. Throughout his career Jimmy has remained committed to biological methods for maintaining healthy turf and soil sustainably. And it is these values that have led to him reuniting with old friends in order to promote a natural ethos to turf managers across the globe.

In the early years of Jimmy's career he held the position of Head Greenkeeper at the Killermont Course at Glasgow Golf Club, one of the oldest golf courses in the world. Here, he cemented a friendship with Ian Macmillan, who was Jimmy's Deputy at the time, but who went on to become Scotland's first Master Greenkeeper and then the co-founder and Turfgrass Biology Director of The Great Turf Company. Working together in the early 1970s, Jimmy and Ian developed a deep interest in soil life and began using carbon to feed micro-organisms in the greens.

Forty years on, Ian and Jimmy continue to advocate microbial greenkeeping and now reunite as Directors of The Great Turf Company, which has become well-known for its biological centred solutions. In a short period of time the company has secured contracts with some of the most prestigious golf and sports field operations in the UK and Europe amongst the Turf Managers who support activated microbial turf science to the benefit of the environment and budgets.

At The Great Turf Company Jimmy will also work alongside Technical Director, Andrew Turnbull, and Managing Director, Ian Morrison, another of Jimmy's past colleagues; the pair worked together in the 1990s when they were at the forefront of the Gleneagles Golf Developments team in the assembly and coordination of the Ryder Cup bid.

In his new post as Global Development Director, Jimmy will focus on creating opportunities for The Great Turf Company to grow internationally, with particular focus on warm season fine turf management. Commenting on the appointment, Ian Morrison said, "With The Great Turf Company expanding so rapidly, including a recent move into Scandinavian markets, it is important that we do not spread ourselves thinly. Bringing Jimmy on board not only enables strength through our shared values but provides us with the optimum level of experience and expertise to make Activated Microbial Turf Management a global success."