Saturday 30 March 2013

Commercial Freezers – 6 Signs You May Need to Upgrade

Commercial freezers and commercial refrigerators are the backbone of any food manufacturing catering company or food retailer. At Porkka we make and sell a variety of high grade, quality refrigeration products fit for a wide range of environments where food and drinks are either made or sold by hotels, supermarkets, corner shops, restaurants and food manufactures. In this blog we look at 6 telltale signs that your commercial freezer provision may not be quite up to the job and how this may be having a detrimental impact on your business.

1. Customers Can't Access Product Quickly

If your business is dependent on the sale of refrigerated foods or even has a refrigerated concession as part of your overall retail offering, then you may be losing revenue if your customers are unable to see or reach your range of produce easily. If freezers or refrigerators are poorly stacked with items fighting for space then it can put customers off making a purchase.

Items that are stored in commercial freezers or refrigerators with solid doors make it more difficult for customers to see your product range and fails to encourage them to select and buy.

Most customers rarely want to guess what is behind a door -they are more likely to buy food and drink that is attractively displayed and where brand, price and best before dates are clearly visible.  This can only be achieved if you have the correct commercial freezer or refrigeration units on the shop floor. Glass door and open fronted freezer and refrigerator units give you the opportunity to maximise storage and display produce along with strong point of sale messaging; making it all far more appealing for customers to buy.

The Porkka Display Line range is comprehensive enough in style and design to suit all sorts of food and drink produce and fit for use in almost all retail situations no matter how big or small. Glass fronted or open fronted commercial freezers and refrigerators that are well lit  generate a far greater number of sales which minimises the risk of products going out of date and being wasted.

2. Current Freezer is Regularly Overfilled

Freezers that are often overfilled can cause problems with temperature evenness which can lead to problems with food quality and even, in extreme cases, potential food poisoning. Overfilled freezers also make stored produce harder to reach, especially those items stuffed towards the back.  Food that is poorly stored may be in breach of health and safety regulations and it is more likely to be left to go out of date and increase wastage which puts pressure on your operating costs.   If this sounds familiar it is a sure sign that you need to increase your freezer or refrigeration space.  

3. You Run Out of Frozen Stock Too Quickly
      
This can happen if customer demand has grown but your order levels are the same, simply because you can only take delivery of and freeze or chill a certain amount of stock at a time. This is a definitive sign that you need increased freezer space to reflect your actual demand. A freezer isn't just for long term storage space, but is also for storing produce that will be used within a day or two of purchase; this is especially likely for a restaurant or takeaway which cooks from frozen.  By not upgrading to a larger freezer you could be limiting the turnover of your business.

4. You Need More Freezer Space but Can't Spare Any More Floor Space

In tough economic times, all businesses are looking for ways to increase their customer base and find new streams of income. Previously "static" food businesses like restaurants which were operating out of specific premises often expand their business by diversifying into outside catering services to cover functions, weddings and festivals.  This drastically changes your refrigeration and freezing requirements. The Cold Line cabinets known also as the Arctic Counters are the most versatile in the Porkka range as they are designed to enable you to chill or freeze, prepare and then display food. These commercial freezer and refrigeration units are also extremely mobile as they come with castor feet and come in a variety of heights and with a worktop height of 900mm in order to easily prepare food on site. All of these features make outside catering and business expansion far more possible. 

5. You're Actively Exploring New Ways to Expand Your Business


If you are a business which is expanding its throughput but isn't in a position to move to bigger premises then you may need to change your commercial freezer and refrigeration set up. This can be done with the use of upright cabinet freezers which make better use of your available floor space.  Our Future Plus cabinets are perfect for all food related businesses and are designed for heavy duty usage and maximising space.

6. You're Looking for Stricter Ways to Ensure Food Hygiene

Food Hygiene Ratings are now being displayed publicly on business premises and published on the Food Standards Agency website. This is making the food industry at large take a harder look at its food hygiene practices. Food manufacturers, hotels and restaurants are not just looking at their everyday hygiene practices, but at inventive ways of being able to demonstrate and report on their practices. This is of particular use when being inspected by the Food Standard Agency Hygiene Inspectors who are looking for detailed data which can be time consuming to produce if done manually. All commercial freezers and refrigerators must be maintained in accordance with the European HACCP food safety regulations. This involves regular checking and recording of refrigerator and freezer temperatures to ensure any fluctuations are not detrimental to the foodstuffs stored.

Manual monitoring is not always as safe or as thorough as automated real time monitoring like Porkka's XWEB system, which not only provides comprehensive reports but also has the capability of reacting to climate changes within the commercial freezer or refrigerator as soon as they are detected. The system is so effective that it can then automatically adjust the temperature and bring it back in line - and if this is not sufficient then XWEB sends further alarms or alerts to staff advising them to take further action.

This real time monitoring and reporting facility goes a long way in helping you maintain strict hygiene measures and reduce operational costs and energy consumption.  XWEB is also able to tell you how often the doors are opened and indicate particularly busy periods of the day. Fridges and freezers made by Porkka with automatic HACCP monitoring and recording are an easy way to demonstrate how safely you store you produce and products and will help you maintain your food hygiene ratings.

Commercial Freezers – Click here to view our  range of freezers

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