Gripsure hosts charity golf day

Gripsure and Just Mortgages are delighted to be sponsoring the inaugural Charity Golf Day, on Saturday 29th April 2023, in aid of Little Harbour.

Little Harbour is one of three hospices run by the charity Children’s Hospice South West, providing care for children and young people with life-limiting conditions, as well as support for their families.

Based in St. Austell, Little Harbour offers a home-from-home where children and young people with life-limiting conditions and their families can take a short break away from home to recharge their batteries in a homely, warm and welcoming environment. This respite service provides a much-needed break from the ongoing strains of caring for their children at home, juggling professional and medical appointments as well as maintaining family life and employment.

In addition, Little Harbour also provides specialist palliative care, a sibling service for brothers and sisters, emergency support, end of life care and a bereavement service for as long as is needed.

About the day

We have 20 tee times available, starting at 10am, and once they’re gone, they’re gone! Included in your ticket:

⛳   18 holes of golf in teams of four
⛳   Prizes for the nearest pin, longest drive, team Stableford
⛳   Raffle entry
⛳   Tea/coffee and bacon bap on arrival

How to Enter

Whether you’re a golfing novice or fancy yourself as the next Rory Mcllroy, we would love for you to join us on the day, all in the name of charity!

To enter, please visit our Just Giving page to donate £240 as a four-ball. Please then email confirmation of your four players, along with their handicaps, to Mike Nicholson at mike@gripsure.co.uk to receive your starting time.

All £240 goes straight to Little Harbour. To learn more about the fantastic work Children’s Hospice South West does please visit their website. We hope you can help us support this brilliant charity.

Meet the Gripsure team: Achim Rohr, Head of Sales D/A/CH Region

Achim joined Gripsure SAS in 2022 and is now responsible for growing the brand throughout Germany, Austria and Switzerland. We catch up with him to find out a little more about his role with the company and his interests outside of work.

What do you enjoy most about your job?

I particularly enjoy the variety in my work and the fact that I always meet new customers, suppliers and businesses across different regions and always learn something new.

I’m also a fan of natural timber and have always enjoyed working with wood, so I’m naturally interested in the wide range of applications for our products and finding out about the different projects where our decking is used.

What skills and personality traits do you think are most important in your role?

Getting enjoyment from dealing with people, always wanting to learn something new and being reliable. I rather promise less and then deliver more than the other way round. This way you build trust and place your customers at the centre and if you do that consistently, success for the business will come almost as a side effect.

The ability to deal with a multitude of tasks and to prioritise them effectively without getting stressed is also important in my role, particularly at this stage where we are building the Gripsure brand in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Fortunately, I have two great teams supporting me from both France and the UK.

What did you do before you came to Gripsure and how does that help you in your current position?

I’ve been working in business development and sales for more than 25 years across a range of industries ranging from publishing to software development, fine foods, media production & broadcast to building supplies. I’ve been providing consultancy services in the UK for many years, mostly with a focus on business development and sales as well as export strategies.

Having spent a lot of time working closely with business owners of SMEs as well as some startups does not only help us, but in particular our customers, since I have learnt to view requirements through their eyes in order to understand what’s really important to them. This often helps to turn customers into long-term business partners. So for me it’s not simply about selling a product, but finding the best solution for our customers.

Who or what inspires you?

Nature. If you take the time to observe nature you can learn so much, it provides me with constant inspiration. With people, I’m inspired by those who have achieved a high degree of skill in a particular discipline. I’m not talking about intellect here, but about an intelligence to overcome your own ego in order to “flow” from a natural state, without limiting thoughts.

In my late teenage years I had the good fortune to train under Dan Inosanto, one of Bruce Lee’s teachers and later also to train with a couple of Muay Thai champions in Thailand. That was really inspirational and has influenced me to this day.

In my twenties I spent some time on retreats in Buddhist monasteries, some of the monks who I met there have also been an inspiration to me.

What is your greatest achievement (or what are your greatest achievements) in your career or personal life?

Working in a business development and sales environment has always provided me with the opportunity to have a major impact on a business’ growth. In general, I have always felt a sense of achievement when successfully completing a new business launch in a new market for one of my clients, or proving the viability of their concept or a new product. Seeing a company grow and take on new staff because of new business I had generated for them has always provided me with a sense of achievement.

On a personal level I was quite committed to my favourite sport in the late eighties and managed to win several Kickboxing competitions including German Kickboxing Champion and European Contact Karate Champion, I was quite proud of that.

I also spent nearly three years travelling across South and Southeast Asia and Australasia in the early to mid-nineties to satisfy my curiosity about foreign landscapes, cultures and their people. It was a great experience helping me gain lots of insights, the achievement for me was my “degree in the university of life”, something I treasure to this day.

By far my greatest achievement though is a well-balanced and active lifestyle with a happy family living in one of the most beautiful coastal areas in the Southwest of England, this is priceless to me.

Fun Facts:

  • Former German Kickboxing champion and European Contact Karate Champion (late 80s)
  • Used to have an underwater videography business in Thailand
  • Fully qualified PADI Open Water Scuba Diving instructor
  • Previously registered as a stuntman for Hong Kong’s Shaw Brothers Studios (…and then turned down a request to perform a car chase – otherwise I’d likely be at the bottom of Hong Kong harbour now…)