Pursuing products at the GIS

Day 1 at the GCSAA Golf Industry Show here in Las Vegas, and my quest is to locate as many new products as possible.

Thank you, Wiedenmann, for making my job easier.

When you plaster the word NEW in big, bold letters on your flyer, I knew I hit the jackpot (pun intended because, after all, I am in Vegas) inside the Las Vegas Convention Center. So here I was, at Booth 242, checking out Wiedenmann's new Mega Twister. Thank you to Wiedenmann territory manager Mike Smith for providing me with a quick tutorial on the product.

"It's the first ever with 20,000 CFMs. It's the most powerful of its kind in the industry," Smith tells me. "This is the first day the public gets to see it."

The Mega Twister, a leaf blower for tractors that is supposed to be ideal on golf courses, can swivel 270 degrees. And, Smith says, you hardly know it is there on the course.

"It's quiet. Whisper-quiet," he says. 

Some other new products I have come across so far include:

*Bunker Border by Ames. It's an eco-friendly product that is made to extend the life of sand bunkers by reinforcing, strengthening and stabilizing the edges of the traps.

*Wittek Golf Supply introduces the 50G-JR Ballwasher. It's a polyethylene tank that is made to wash nearly 10,000 balls per hour.

*Spraying Devices Inc. launches the Turf Walker SC Self-Contained Walking Spray Broom. It features a tricycle chassis with semi-pneumatic wheels and comes with a rechargeable battery.

*Phoenix Environmental Care, LLC has the Wingman DFX BATPak. The company calls it "a better way to buy, store and use pesticides and make recycling faster and easier" with this container. The BAT in BATPak stands for Buy, Apply, Turn in). The containers are returnable and reusable.