New to the app? Here’s a handy checklist to go through to help get the most out of it 👌

The most important thing first — make sure you add the app to your phone Home Screen as an icon. Once you do that, it functions just like a normal app.

Checklist:

1. Set your name and display name
If you want a bit more privacy on the public forum, make sure your display name doesn’t personally identify you, as forum posts are publicly visible. They sync through to the Forum page on the NZLA website. This is the only public part of the app. People can read posts publicly, but they can’t engage or comment unless they’re subscribed and logged in.

2. Set a profile picture
Adds a bit of personality to the app and makes it much easier for everyone to recognise each other across the forum and journal.

3. Set your location
This powers features like soil temperatures, evaporation rates, and other location-based tools throughout the app. The default location is Ryechurch.

4. Add your first lawn under “My Lawns”
Definitely worth doing early on so everything links together properly throughout the app.

5. Set up “My Stock”
One of the best features in the app. Spend a bit of time going through the shed and roughly working out how much product is left in each bottle or bag, then add it into My Stock.

When you log product applications in your journal, the app automatically deducts stock levels, so it’s worth setting up properly from the start.

We will make this auto update when orders are placed later in the project.

6. Make your first journal post
Once you do your next application, add it to your journal. This is where the app really starts becoming useful over time. The journal feed is one of my favourite parts of the app.

7. Follow members
You can follow:
• Everyone
• Specific members
• Members by grass species
• Members by location

This makes your journal feed much more relevant to your own lawn type and climate.

8. If you follow the NZLA application guide
You can find it under Tools and add those applications into your journal as planned activities.

9. Set up your GDD growing season dates
If you’re planning to use the GDD tracking tools, there’s an article in the Lawn Tips section explaining how they work.

You’ll want to set the start of your growing season based on when growth normally starts kicking off again in your area.

Generally:
• Upper North Island: often late July
• Most areas: around 1 August
• Further south: sometimes a bit later

The key is setting it around when your lawn actually starts actively growing again. They can seem a bit daunting at first, but they’re excellent for PGR applications.

10. The NZLA shop is also a breeze to order through the app , it’s only just been added.
You’ll find it under Tools. One of the best parts is being able to save your address in Settings so checkout auto-populates.

The shop categories are being cleaned up over the coming days, they’re a bit messy at the moment.

I’ll also be introducing a lower free shipping threshold for app subscribers soon — just working through that now.

Lastly, you’ll still see changes and improvements happening over the next 4 weeks as we continue refining things. It’s very much still an active project. Once everything’s wrapped up properly, we’ll package it into a full App Store and Google Play app, then it’ll simply be download and login.