For any business in the food industry, efficient commercial fridge organisation is vitally important because it ensures food safety and reduces spoilage and waste. Making sure that your commercial fridge is organised effectively also helps your kitchen run more efficiently because your staff will always know where to find what they’re looking for quickly and easily. Here are some tips and tricks to help you organise your commercial fridge.
Keep Your Produce Labelled And Categorised
It’s essential all your fresh food is labelled correctly and has the relevant ‘use by’ or ‘best before’ dates on it. How you store your produce is also crucial and it does help to label your shelves and have separate areas for different categories of foods.
- Keep your meat on the lower shelves so that any leakages won’t spoil any of your other produce.
- Keep fresh fruits and vegetables well away from the fans in your commercial cool room, so that they don’t suffer damage from the intensive blast of cold air.
- Never store goods on the floor to allow for easy cleaning.
Optimise Temperature Zones
In any commercial fridge or cool room, the lower shelves will always be the coldest because, as you know, hot air rises. This means that your most temperature-sensitive products should always be stored on the lower shelves. This includes meat, fish, seafood and dairy products.
The higher shelves can then be used to store less sensitive products like fruits, vegetables and prepared meals. It’s also important to allow for plenty of airflow around your products and not to stack things too closely together.
Ensure Your Staff Use The FIFO Method
If your commercial fridge is filled correctly, new stock should always be placed behind current produce. This ensures that the goods are utilised correctly using the FIFO (first in, first out) method.
This is the perfect way to ensure that there’s minimal wastage and that everything gets used by its expiration date. To get this right, it’s important to never overfill your cool room so that everything is accessible with ease.
Do Regular Stock Takes
It’s a good idea to assign a staff member to check your cool room inventory regularly. For highly perishable items, it’s best to do an inventory check on them daily. Goods that have longer storage times should be checked at least weekly.
If everything has been labelled correctly before going into the coolroom, this check should take minimal time and will result in less food wastage because you’ll always know what’s on hand and what needs to be restocked.
Schedule Regular Maintenance Checks
As well as organising all the fresh produce within your cool room correctly, you also want to ensure that everything is functioning as it should and there are no leaks or gaps within the structure of the cool room. That’s why it’s important to schedule regular commercial cool room maintenance checks so that you can:
- Check the seals on your cool room door
- Repair any damage quickly
- Ensure cleanliness standards are adhered to
- Make sure that nothing is being stored on the floor
- Check that there’s plenty of airflow and ventilation around your stock
Efficient Commercial Fridge Storage Will Help Your Business Thrive
At the end of the day, efficient commercial fridge organisation will help your bottom line and ensure that your business thrives. Knowing how to organise your cool room will save both time and money by ensuring there’s less food spoilage and far less waste that needs to be disposed of and subsequently replenished.
If you’re running out of coolroom space or you’re planning on expanding your cold storage, please feel free to give us a call on 03 9729 8155 so that we can help you with the supply and installation of a commercial fridge or cool room. We’ll be more than happy to discuss your needs with you.