It could have been a game breaker. But some small town enterprise, ingenuity, and a complex mix of deals, inside knowledge and oodles of goodwill, has triumphed for Te Puke Sports and Recreation Club.

The Club was in the market for some grandstand seating and wanted to buy some from the condemned Lancaster Park Stadium in Christchurch – due for deconstruction because of earthquake damage.

Te Puke Sport doesn't have a grandstand to put them in ….. not yet.

'We are putting the horse before the cart by buying the seats.”

But there was a problem, a major problem, which was in danger of undoing the plan. How to get 330 stadium seats a thousand kilometers from Lancaster Park in the Christchurch suburb of Waltham all the way to Atuaroa Avenue in the heartland of kiwifruit country in Bay of Plenty?

Zespri was approached to see if they had any shipping connections to bring the seats north by coastal sea transport.

Wheels began turning. Zespri shipping manager, Mike Knowles contacted their kiwifruit shipping agents, Oceanic Navigation.

Principals of Oceanic Navigation, Bruce Nesbit and John Malyon pulled strings by going to Takeshige San of FCC Shipping, owner of the vessel.

'Yes,” said Takeshige San. 'We are happy to carry the seats from Christchurch to Tauranga provided there is no cost to us and the vessel is not unduly delayed through loading and unloading.” The plan was slowly but surely coming together.

'I am delighted we can help, and provide a bit of exposure for FCC in Te Puke,” says Bruce Nesbit of Oceanic Navigation. 'FCC are a great carrier who have provided service to New Zealand kiwifruit for the last 30 years, and are committed to the next 30 years.”

So 300 seats from a former international sport stadium at just $10 apiece. The Lancaster Park Project manager at the Christchurch City Council was so taken by the enthusiasm of the Te Puke Sports Club, it threw in a further 30 seats free of charge.

Next problem. Where to store the seats, how to palletise, where to palletise and who to palletise for the trip north?

Oceanic Shipping's Stephen Black noted that New Zealand wide fruit and vegetable marketer, MG Marketing, was discharging pineapples and bananas from Oceanic Navigation vessels at Lyttelton.

Often these vessels bring an excess of pallets, and some of the pallets were offered by free of charge by MG Marketing.

A senior manager of that marketing company, Roger Georgieff just happened to be a member of the Sumner Rugby Football Club. The club organized working bees to pick up the seats from Lancaster Park, transport them to MG's yard and do the palletizing.

With progress came further problems. The fruit pallets were unsuitable - they needed bigger and stronger ones. People knew people who knew people and suitable pallets were found in Timaru and kindly donated by Fonterra. Then Hugo McKeown from Temuka Transport agreed to get the pallets from Timaru to Christchurch free of charge.

C3 Stevedores at Port of Lyttelton waived stevedoring fees for the vessel carrying the seats and provided space on the port for storage of the pallets prior to loading. That was after Brenics Trabnsport was shoulder tapped for a free lift from MG Marketing's yard to the port.

At this end, stevedoring at Port of Tauranga will be at no cost to Te Puke Sports, courtesy of ISO Stevedoring and TKL Logistics. And finally, local kiwifruit contractor and transporter Brett Hutchings will cart the pallets from the wharf to MPAC's kiwifruit pack house facility where the seats will be stored until the new grandstand at Te Puke's Murray Salt Stadium gets underway.

'The seats were a great deal,” says Te Puke Sport's Ash Peat. 'We have this rickety old grandstand which is near the end of life. There's a concept plan for a new one, but when the seats from Lancaster Park came up for sale, we thought we better grab them and worry about the grandstand later.”

They dispatched club member, Rex Olsen, to Christchurch. 'He knows about these things, he looked them over and said we better have a bit of this.”

The sums all stacked up – 300 seats at $10 a seat. 'We checked on line and much inferior stadium seats were going for more than $100. So it was an excellent deal,” says Ash. And an extra 30 free seats.

The new grandstand at Murray Salt Stadium maybe still a concept but the club hopes to have it built and the Lancaster Park seats in place for the beginning of the 2019 rugby season.”

And even before the Lancaster seats even landed in Tauranga, 220 seats had been on sold to the community for $100. It's a fundraiser.

'You get your name on the seat, but you don't get to put your bum on it.” The seats are due to land in Tauranga today.

In a press release, Te Puke Sports says 'it's been greatly privileged in receiving such support, and sincerely thanks all companies and individuals that have pitched in to help us. Without this spontaneous and generous assistance, the project would not have been possible.”

Moving part of Lancaster Park to Te Puke was no mean feat. 'And while the project isn't completed, it's timely and necessary to salute those who made it all possible.”