Former Arsenal star Henri Lansbury is growing from strength to strength in his new career after retiring from football.
The ex-Premier League star announced that he would be hanging up his boots last summer, aged 32, after being part of the Luton Town squad that sealed promotion to the Premier League.
A serious knee injury restricted the midfielder to 10 appearances that term but Lansbury was already pulling up trees with his lawn fertiliser company Grass Gains.
Lansbury, who made eight senior appearances for the Gunners, discovered his passion for lawns during lockdown. He has proven to be an instant success in the gardening world, with his Grass Gains products being sold in Homebase, and has already mown the pitches that he used to rip up as a youngster at Arsenal's Hale End training ground.
In a short space of time, Lansbury has worked on Fulham's Craven Cottage, as well as further afield at Monaco and Genk. "We’re going in the right direction, a few local clubs have asked for it and we’ve put it down on their pitches as well,” Lansbury told talkSPORT.
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"I want to give back to the local clubs really, I want them to have a nice pitch to play on, there’s nothing better than a kid running on a pitch with stripes on it and that’s what it does, it helps stripe it off."
After scoring what proved to be his final career goal in September 2022, Lansbury produced a lawn mowing celebration and it was revealed that Luton had given him a patch of the training ground to work his magic. When asked for a review, Luton striker Carlton Morris said, “Honestly it’s like a bowls pitch. He knows his way around the garden that’s for sure.”
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Former Arsenal midfielder Henri Lansbury has launched fertiliser company Grass Gains (Instagram/@thelawnlad)
Henri Lansbury played under Arsene Wenger at Arsenal (Getty Images)The former England U21 international was once tipped for the top by Arsene Wenger, back in 2010: “He will be a big player for me,” the Arsenal boss said. “He is at the moment having a very interesting experience [at Watford] that we judge to be very successful. He will come back at the end of the season and practice with the first team in the next pre-season. Then we will assess the situation with him together."
However, Lansbury was eventually sold to Nottingham Forest for £1m in 2012 after a series of loan spells, subsequently signing for Aston Villa. After previously striving to be part of Arsenal's first team, Lansbury’s new ambition is to work on the pitch at the Emirates Stadium.
The 33-year-old is a self-described lawn artist, using ‘The Lawn Lad’ as his moniker on social media, and was crowned top influencer of 2023 by Turf Business, Inspired to create Grass Gains after finding issues with toxic fertiliser, Lansbury explained the company’s early success and the importance of keeping your garden in top shape.
“A lot of it is to do with branding. You see the other companies… all plastic boxes, quite dull, quite boring. I’m just trying to lift the gardening world," Lansbury said.
“If you make your grass nice, it’s like another room in the house. You could add £10-15k if your grass is nice. Don’t just chuck all your rubbish into the garden. A lot of our complaints are about grass not growing in certain areas. It’s full of bricks, full of plastics. They kill the soil. Our product lifts the soil and helps it regenerate.”
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