Prevent damage to land, vehicles and visitors with solutions from three suppliers of ground protection products
Dan Devenish, head of global sales
Ground-Guards
0113 267 6000
www.ground-guards.co.uk
What advice can you give an event organiser on ground protection?
Never trust the British weather! We’ve seen rain and mud completely ruin ‘unprotected’ events in the past, with wheels getting stuck in the mud and people slipping and sliding all over the place.
You want people to remember your event for all the right reasons, and so the inclusion of ground protection in a marketing budget is a must.
Watch out for ‘hidden’ costs – aluminium boards for example are extremely heavy and require expensive lifting equipment to lay them. Make sure your supplier is upfront about costs and clear about application. Ground-Guards offers free consultation to ensure the appropriate mat and tread pattern is selected for a specific job.
What is the USP of your product?
Ground-Guards’ high quality ground protection mats are made from 100% recycled plastic. Our mats are lightweight and very easy to handle, which means that two workers can comfortably lift the mats without the need to hire any specialist or expensive lifting equipment. This represents a great cost saving for any event organiser.
As well as being light, our mats are also incredibly strong. They won’t break under pressure, making them suitable to hold all vehicle types and heavy equipment. Our MultiTrack mat is so strong in fact, that we guarantee it unbreakable by vehicles up to 120 tonnes.
We believe that no other ground protection solutions are as strong, light, portable and easy to install as the Ground-Guards’ range.
What options do you have for small, medium and large budgets?
With Ground-Guards, a little budget can go a long way, so whether the requirement is for a temporary car park, roadway, wheelchair access, stage area, footpath or more, there is a solution for every event.
All our mats are competitively priced and provide a fantastic return on investment. We offer flexible options and great customer service. Mats can either be purchased or hired depending on need: our consultation team will provide free expert advice on which mat is best suited for a client’s need.
Where has your product been used?
Longleat Safari Park approached us last winter as they wanted to turn grass fields into a 6,000 sqm overflow car park, to cater for thousands of extra visitors who would come to see their annual Winter Festival of Lights event.
Safety was of course the paramount concern so we recommended our high traction MultiTrack mats to ensure zero slips, trips and accidents.
A total of 2,000 MultiTrack mats were laid to create a safe, functional and aesthetically-pleasing car park with enough space to park an additional 300 vehicles.
Graham Crisp, director
GT Trax
01487 823344
www.gttrax.co.uk
What advice can you give an event organiser on ground protection?
Throughout the past 12 years we have seen a significant growth in the use of plastic trackway and ground protection for outside events. Most event organisers are fully tuned in to their requirements, however, some don’t realise that we offer a pre-event site inspection. These visits can often help to resolve any issues before our teams arrive on site.
What is the USP of your product?
GT Trax is a rental company supplying a range of plastic trackway, ground protection and temporary flooring to the events markets. The company was formed in 2005 and remains independently owned and managed.
The move from traditional metal trackway to recycled plastic has taken off over the past few years. We believe that we have been one of the pioneers in this change. Our new Power Tracks 40 temporary roadway system, launched in 2015, has all the attributes of metal trackway but with the advantage of being environmentally sustainable, as it’s made from recycled (and probably more importantly – recyclable) plastic. Also, using plastic trackway can help to reduce an organisers security costs, as plastic has no discernible resale value, whereas metal is a valuable commodity.
Outside events can generate a lot of mud! Recognising the ecological impact of the volumes of water which were required to clean our panels, we developed, in collaboration with a local supplier of cleaning equipment, a bespoke automatic ground plate cleaning machine, which operates using recycled rainwater.
What options do you have for small, medium and large budgets?
We have a range of trackway, ground protection and temporary flooring all ideally suited for use at outside events. We will supply most types of outside event that require our products no matter how large or small. There are no minimum quantities or other stipulations – we will put in exactly the same effort to ensure that an event organiser has the right type of equipment.
Where has your product been used?
In 2016 we supplied both our Power Tracks 20 and Power Tracks 40 trackway systems to the popular Green Man festival based in Powys. The organiser deployed the lighter duty Power Tracks 20 for safely guiding cars and vans onto site and the heavy duty Power Tracks 40 for bringing in articulated trucks. We were humbled when two of the festival organisers made a visit to our stand at the 2016 Showman’s Show to thank us personally for our services and for supplying the exact products to suit their requirements.
Dan Brown, group sales manager
Grassform Group
07818 040529 / www.grassform.co.uk
What advice can you give an event organiser on ground protection?
Always prepare for the worst weather! We have had several of our event organisers be hopeful of sunshine and try to cut back on trackway, then the event has come to a halt the moment the rain has started. Rain causes some events to have major problems getting deliveries in and around the site safely and has even caused some of them to be cancelled.
What is the USP of your product?
Our trackway has a unique chevron grip surface, which provides incredible grip and traction and also dispels mud from vehicles as they drive over it, keeping them safer while on-site. It is virtually indestructible and can take over 100 tonnes in weight on a single 3m wide roadway. It is made from 100% recycled materials and is environmentally friendly. It is approved for use on SSSI sites so will not disturb the habitats of local species living there. Is it very quick to deploy and take up and causes no lasting damage to the ground it’s been on. It is also made from a none valuable material, so is not a theft risk and does not require additional security or insurances in place to cover it.
What options do you have for small, medium and large budgets?
Our Euromats are a lightweight trackway system for small budgets and can be laid by hand using a two man lift. They are still very robust and can be walked on or driven on and will take up to 25 tonnes in weight. For larger budgets we recommend our machine laid Tuff Trak – this is more robust and will not move around once laid as each piece weighs over 290kg.
Please mention an event that has used your product and how it performed
We are currently working with UK Live who do all the ‘Let’s Rock’ events along with Penne Festival and Lockdown Festival. Our Trackway is used for pad areas to allow heavy cranes to build stages. It is also used for walkways and other roadways. The system performed excellently and did everything the client had hoped for, kept everything moving on-site and most importantly kept all the vehicles safe. Since using this the client has now signed up to a multi year deal to work with us on every event.
