New Horizon - Issue 3 - Construction

Attention to detail promotes
customer retention
Over the past 22 years in business under the banner of Blade
& Spade, offering garden and estate management services
throughout the Isle of Wight, Andrew Taylor puts his success
down to two key elements; doing the job in a timely and
professional manner and, using the highest quality equipment.
“Stemming back to when I very first started, I’ve still got many
customers from those early days on my regular schedule,”
commented Andrew Taylor, “it’s a personal thing with me because
I always aim at giving complete, customer satisfaction. For
example, where grass mowing is concerned, I’m very pernickety
about keeping the blades sharp on my mowers. If I don’t, then the
customers will complain about the cut finish and I want to avoid
that happening at all costs. Reputation in our industry is key!”
Blade & Spade offers a wide range of garden and estate
management services including beds, borders, lawns, mulching,
pruning, wide-area grass management and hedge-cutting. One
such project he was working on, The Woodland Burial site - had
very low hanging trees and it was almost impossible to trim the
grass other than by hand - which would have been very timeconsuming.
“We decided to find the right type of mower that
would operate in these challenging conditions,” commented
Andrew, “and we purchased a John Deere Z335E mower from
the Hunt Forest Group on the Island. The Z Series mower will
turn on a sixpence, has a very low profile and is almost like a
mini go-kart. But it can access these hard-to-get-to areas and
does a great job, leaving a perfect finish. It’s opened up other
opportunities where a low profile is essential.”
Some of the equipment in Blade & Spade’s arsenal include; a
GreenMech chipper for ‘on-the-spot’ chipping and shredding wood
and green waste for mulching; a John Deere X948 ride-on mower
and a John Deere X335E - both for high-quality grass mowing; a
Kawasaki 750 Quad; a Kramer 357 Tele-handler - handles all kinds
of materials - and also helps out on Andrew’s farm; Ifor Williams
trailer for transporting machinery to the work site and an Isuzu pickup
truck, to tow the machinery around the island.
“All of this equipment I have acquired through the Hunt Forest
Group on the island,” said Andrew, “as they sell what I consider to
be the best equipment, they have an excellent reputation for aftersales
back-up and servicing. Nothing is ever too much trouble for
them and if I have an issue, they could be out within the hour and
we are back up and running again in no time - I have experienced
that happening even on a Sunday! That’s what I call service!
Since we started the business, I’ve had four of the John Deere
ride-on mowers, three of the Zero turn mowers and they have
never had any serious breakdown issues. I’ve had the ISUZU
since 2013 and it’s still doing a great job.”
Daily servicing for Blade & Spade’s equipment requires, in the
main - simple greasing and checking for belt tension or water
levels “Major, year-end servicing is carried out by Hunt Forest and
is always ready in plenty of time before next season commences.”
enthused Andrew. “I have a personal approach to my business
and that is; wherever we have been and completed a job, if I
would be happy to have done this job in my own backyard and
would be totally satisfied with the end result, then I think my
customers would be pleased with it also. I think that’s very much
how the team at Hunt Forest approach their customer service in a
very similar way to us and that’s why we get along so well.”
Meet our Accounts Team at Chilbolton
(left) Helen Trueman as Sales Ledger, Tricia Dewey and Bridget Cox as Purchase
Ledgers and Holly Hunt as Sales Ledger.
Accounting system data at Hunt Forest Group has merged
and we are in the process of consolidating accounts from
NFFM and R.Hunt Ltd. Thank you to our customers for your
patience and co-operation through this time.
The accounts team are now based at our Head Office
at Chilbolton. They can be reached on the following:
Purchase Ledger - purchaseledger@huntforest.com
01264 860 532
Sales Ledger - salesledger@huntforest.com 01264 860 532
We are always trying to do our bit for the environment, so
if you would like to receive your statements and invoices by
email, please email salesledger@huntforest.com
Steve Cox Financial Director
HUNTFOREST.COM 15