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Local businesses teed up for PGA event

Ready for action: Port Royal Golf Club hosts the Bermuda Championships PGA tour event at the end of the month. A range of local businesses will be providing products and services (File photograph)

Like the America’s Cup before it, the Bermuda Championship PGA tour event is proving to be a boon for local businesses.

Organisers of the tournament, to be held October 31 through November 3 at Port Royal Golf Club, have enlisted more than 20 companies to provide goods and services for the event.

Tournament director Sean Sovacool moved to the island in July, and soon thereafter issued an RFP with the assistance of the Bermuda Economic Development Corporation and the Bermuda Tourism Authority.

Mr Sovacool said: “There was a lot of interest when we put up the RFP, people really reacted favourably, but then there was some fall-off when people came to fill out the RFP and they realised that they couldn’t deliver all the various items or services we were asking for. But ultimately we fulfilled all the various categories that we need.”

A meeting has been held with vendors to explain the tournament timeline, and identify where on that continuum their provision of goods or services fits.

Mr Sovacool works for the US-based Bruno Events Team, which organises 10 golf tournaments annually on different tours.

Each location, he said, presents a different set of challenges.

“I would love it if it were the same process every time, but there is good and bad everywhere,” Mr Sovacool said.

“It is mainly good in Bermuda, but since we are on an island, we really need to plan things out in advance because there are some resources we don’t have on-island, so shipping plays an important role.”

Experience gained on-island from hosting events such as the America’s Cup, World Rugby Classic and ITU World Triathlon Series has also proved beneficial, according to the organisers.

Mr Sovacool said: “Bermuda is accustomed to holding these events.”

Companies providing goods or services include: Goslings, beer and wine; CEO Transport, buses; Butterfield & Vallis, food/product; Dunkley’s Dairy, water/soft drinks; Fourways and Bonefish/Bella Vista, catering; Docksider, concessions; Just Shirts, dry cleaning; SAS, fencing; Rubis Energy Bermuda Ltd, fuelling; Ice to Go, ice; St John’s Ambulance, medical services; TOPS, office equipment; Island Press, printing; Daren Williams, taxi management; Bermuda Sanitation and Engineering Ltd, restrooms; East End Telecom, radios; GET Security, security; Fast Forward Freight, shipping; Digicel, telecom; Paynter’s Towing and Salvage, towing; ICS, trucking; A. David Atcheson Ltd, waste removal/dumpsters.