Specify, Design, Build & Commission a New Warehouse

The Opportunity

Here, the opportunity was to deliver a brand new 6,000m2 refrigerated warehouse in only four months. The Florette chilled salad production and distribution facility in Lichfield was expanding to meet the growing demand for high quality fresh produce. A key element of the Florette customer proposition is freshness – with the need for foods, such as salads, to be kept in optimum conditions to stay fresh and crisp throughout its journey to the supermarket.

Hence the need for a new, state-of-the-art refrigerated storage facility.

But more than that – having carried out a full feasibility study into the project and determined what it would take to meet budget, timescale and quality requirements, adi Projects re-defined the project parameters to include the infrastructure to support the new facility.

The Solution

adi Projects drew on the skills and experience of adi Climate Systems, adi Electrical and adi Mechanical to create a united team to deliver a total engineered solution. This is a classic example of how multiple adi divisions work together on a single multi-faceted client project.

The team came together initially to create the user requirement specification, which was agreed with the client, and then tender the work competitively.

On award, they set to work designing the facility covering, refrigeration plant, white-walling, and the mechanical, electrical and building management control systems. All of these services were delivered by adi directly, using in-house expertise.

With design work done, adi built the warehouse, with split ambient and chilled zones. The finished building is capable of holding 2,000 pallets at ambient temperature and 800 pallets at a tightly controlled 40c. There's a shuttle racking system - again specified and installed by adi - across the two zones.

Beyond the warehouse, adi also designed and built new management offices, a full set of operator facilities with associated roadways and car parking. All of which was delivered absolutely to spec, on time and on budget.

The Benefits

Florette's engineers and the team at adi developed a highly effective working partnership on the project which extends to this day.

One thing that really helped, is that adi has the capability to deliver a wide range of engineering skills as one in-house team, with short lines of communication and no external suppliers. This means the relationship is much easier for the client to manage.

It also makes for a much more efficient delivery and Florette certainly benefitted from this. In fact, it would have been impossible to deliver this project in the timescale without a full range of engineering resources - including excellent project leadership from adi Projects - at our disposal from the start.