Display cases can be convenient for customers, but a hit on your bottom line.
Open air refrigerated display cases commonly seen in grocery stores can provide easy access to products for customers. The main problem with these refrigerators is that they are constantly fighting the ambient air, causing their refrigeration units to work much harder than if they were enclosed. They also increase heating bills for grocery stores in the winter as they constantly dump cold air into the heated building. You’ll know this to be true if you’ve ever caught a chill while walking through grocery aisles with display cases. Grocery stores are starting to catch on to the benefits of walk-in coolers and substituting glass-door merchandising walk-ins and walk-in dairy rooms for these cases. The following article details the energy saving efforts of a grocery store chain in Britain.
Makro is to install walk-in dairy rooms at 17 of its 30 cash & carries by the end of the year.
The move is part of an energy saving drive which will enable pubs to source supplies with a smaller carbon footprint. The dairy rooms save energy compared to fridges and chillers in the main store area.
Makro is implementing a range of energy saving initiatives, as part of a drive to reduce is its energy consumption by 19 per cent.
The group will also replace the lighting at 13 stores with low hanging energy saving lamps, and install new freezer chests at 15 stores.
Georg Behrens, head of real estate, engineering and energy at Makro said: “This huge energy saving program is a step toward achieving our sustainability policy and follows a series of initiatives launched by the company over the recent months.
“In line with our new business approach, the new dairy rooms help us provide a true ‘one-stop-shop’ for our professional customers, reinforcing our competitive edge and clearly differentiating us from our competition.”
Source: The Publican
It is totally logical for stores to have walk in refrigerated areas. Simply just more energy efficient. That is reason enough. Plus the Cases where you have to pull the door open, it is difficult to get at the products.
I do like the idea of Open air refrigerated display cases. One downside- Its cold!
Ok- One possible solution. Offer Snuggie Blankets that go over shoulders when you get inside and put them on the rack as you leave.
Or……A coat rack when you walk in and leave the coat when you walk out.
Put the Walkin at a temperature that preserves the food but does not freeze the customers. That is the quandry.
You never know, your Snuggie idea just may catch on!
Have a walk through warm room. Everywhere you walk is warm, but you can reach in to get the food. A warm room is built like a hallway or as the isles and you some how can put your arm in to where the cases are and it closes when you take your arm and item out. I have seen that somewhere before years and years ago.
Warm room isles wouldn’t cost very much to heat. It just takes a little heat or they will be too hot.