The Big Freeze? No issues…

Just off the M6 in the North West of England sits Lancaster Coldstore conveniently placed for all UK major routes, Ireland, and the Isle of Man.

A family-owned business, the whole operation is run on a day-to-day basis by John Harwood and his son Simon whom combined have over 60 years’ experience in food production, wholesale, retail and the storage and distribution industries.

“Although Lancaster Coldstore is a relatively young company, we have been building our business on an ethos of achieving a first class service to all customers however large or small.”

Having obtained BS EN ISO 9001:2008 within the first 12 months of operating, Lancaster Coldstore is now currently working towards BRC Food Safety accreditation. “We have invested heavily in the business since taking over these premises some three years ago.” Formerly a retail food distribution depot John and Simon have expanded the Coldstore on several occasions to meet with demand.

The Coldstore since their expansion, is now capable of handling more throughput than ever before in an ever increasing market both domestic and internationally. This enables them to provide a wider range of services to their customers, both in the UK and overseas.

The in-depth knowledge that has been gained over the past 60 years has given them a greater understanding when listening to their customer’s needs and the ability to meet their specific requirements on a daily basis. In the fast paced food industry time is a major factor in dealing with all issues, especially temperature control.

An area that Lancaster Coldstore has been able to achieve success is the rapid response they have been able to offer customers when different situations arise. As a family business, customer’s requirements can be adapted quickly and when requests of a different nature are sought, Lancaster Coldstore has the contacts and the knowledge to think outside the box.

The services Lancaster Coldstore can offer are :-

• Decanting
• Hand ball containers
• Blast freezing
• Chamber freezing
• Palletisation
• Inversion
• Trans shipping
• Cross docking
• Consolidation
• Order picking
• Co packing
• Repacking
• Distribution
• Storage
• Tempering

An addition to this they have the capability to handle naked fresh/ frozen block meat through the license they have obtained.

Lancaster Coldstore has the backing of a fleet of 40-ft refrigerated vehicles, fitted with the latest GPS fleet monitoring equipment. Through their own fleet and with selected 3rd Parties they have the scope to deliver fresh, frozen or chilled products to all supermarket RDC’S as well as to other customers around the country on a daily basis. Working closely with customers they offer collection services from overseas suppliers or from here within the UK. With John and Simon’s expansion, David Palmer has been brought on board as a dedicated Logistics Manager, who has over 20 years’ experience in the meat and transport industry.

2011 has seen Lancaster Coldstore diversify its business; this has led to the appointment of a Production Manager who has major experience the food industry from cottage to blue chip production. The services they can provide include Decanting, Tempering, Co Packing, Repacking, and to spearhead the BRC Approved Facility. This has enabled Lancaster Coldstore to win contracts that include supermarket and high street clients as well as high profile frozen food manufacturers.

The company is involved in a steady expansion programme has focused on approval for Category 3, working closely with our External Food Safety Consultant, Local Animal Health Department and DEFRA, Lancaster have been able to achieve this. Giving greater opportunities for customers to expand their product ranges and enables them to keep meat by-products in a remote store for export around the world.

Both John and Simon emphasize, “We offer our customers the exact service that they require and over the past few years have tried to go the extra “two” miles to accommodate and this has paid dividends.”

With additional facilities being available throughout the North West region, Lancaster Coldstore has availability at any time to meet with additional customer demands where it is chilled, frozen or even ambient product requirements.
In the short term, the company is looking to expand its production facility in order to develop further business within the M6 motorway network. A key part of its business is also in dealing with Ireland and the Isle of Man through the nearby port of Heysham, by offering cross-docking and consolidation services.

For further information please telephone 01524 64564