Food Retailers Discuss the Future of Sustainable Refrigeration at Hillphoenix Tech Symposium
Nearly 30 ATMOsphere America attendees took a road trip from Atlanta to Hillphoenix’s Conyers, Georgia, headquarters for a day of delving into refrigeration technologies and trends — and a firsthand look at the latest cooling technology for food retailers. Hillphoenix’s June 24 Technology Symposium, managed by Supermarket Sense, was called “State-of-the-Art is Due for an Update.” It covered refrigeration topics and trends crucial to supermarkets, convenience stores and other food retailers. Among them: Current regulations and anticipated regulatory changes Emerging alternative refrigeration case technology, including developments in Hillphoenix’s Second Nature® CO2 Booster, Cascade and Secondary systems Ways to extend product [...]
Merchandising Tip: Moist and even cooling
Moist and even cooling – the kind that actually extends the life of meat and seafood – are hallmarks of the conduction approach to refrigerated display case design. Conduction is heat transfer through the direct physical contact of two objects (or surfaces) at different temperatures. When two objects are in contact, heat flows from the warmer surface of one to the cooler surface of the other until both reach the same temperature – also known as equilibrium. A display case using conduction includes a special type of deck pan through which a chilled fluid flows. When product is placed on [...]
Small-format trend calls for refrigerated cases designed for small spaces
By Kelly Sayko Hillphoenix Case Division Small-format stores now claim about half of consumers’ short shopping trips, according to market researcher IRI, and traditional retailers are adapting. Big-box stalwart Wal-Mart is reporting same-store growth of nearly 8% at its smaller-footprint Neighborhood Markets stores, compared to just 1.1% for its standard format stores. Meanwhile, small-format rival Aldi, a German discount chain, is planning to add 600 locations in the U.S. by the end of 2018, bringing its nationwide store count to 2,000. Even megastore IKEA is trying out 19,000-square-foot spaces — 94% smaller than the Swedish chain’s largest floor plan. Come [...]
Just Because It’s Difficult Doesn’t Mean We Shouldn’t Try
By Keilly Witman KW Refrigerant Management Strategy LLC This is the second article in a three-part series on sustainability and refrigerants. In part I of my series on communicating about sustainability in refrigeration with consumers, I discussed why it is difficult to make refrigeration relevant to stores’ consumers. Notice I said difficult – not impossible. Just because something is difficult doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. If it were easy, it wouldn’t be a challenge. And if there is anything we all love in this industry, it’s a challenge. I received my first lesson in the relevance of supermarket refrigeration to [...]
Merchandising Tip: Less can be more
Are crowded signs, melting ice, and other distractions stealing the attention away from your fresh meat and seafood? By keeping merchandising simple, you keep the focus on the product.
Natural refrigeration is a challenging sustainability issue for consumers
By Keilly Witman KW Refrigerant Management Strategy LLC This is the first article in a three-part series on sustainability and refrigerants. In this day and age, most supermarket companies recognize that their customers care about the environment and their communities. Customers want to spend their money at businesses that share those values. They want to feel good about where they shop, so they want to know that their grocery store is helping to make their community a better place. Given these facts, and given the enormous progress that many supermarket companies have made in reducing the environmental impact of their [...]
Merchandising Tip: Ice without the hassle
Merchandising seafood without ice saves labor hours and makes clean up quick and easy. Here’s how to get the look of ice without the time and expense. For a free merchandising consultation, visit www.hillphoenix.com/designhelp.
Merchandising Tip: Create a visual focal point
Want to attract more customers to your high-margin meat and seafood departments? Put the focus on the product. Coolgenix conductive refrigeration technology protects the integrity of meat and seafood, so your product is moist, colorful and visually appealing to your customers.
To understand the future of commercial refrigeration, look to CO2’s past
By Derek Gosselin Hillphoenix Systems Product Manager Using carbon dioxide as a refrigerant seems like a new solution to today’s challenge of lowering the global warming potential of commercial refrigeration systems. But, as industry researcher James M. Calm has documented, the use of CO2 as a refrigerant actually stretches back to 1866. In subsequent decades CO2, ammonia and other early refrigerants took a backseat to organic fluoride-based cooling compounds. The first among them was synthesized dichlorodifluoromethane, or R-12, developed in the late 1920s. In 1930, fluorocarbon refrigerants were introduced to the market and quickly became the standard. It took us [...]
Hillphoenix supports Coolgenix customers with onsite training
By Derek Gosselin Hillphoenix Systems Product Manager Using carbon dioxide as a refrigerant seems like a new solution to today’s challenge of lowering the global warming potential of commercial refrigeration systems. But, as industry researcher James M. Calm has documented, the use of CO2 as a refrigerant actually stretches back to 1866. In subsequent decades CO2, ammonia and other early refrigerants took a backseat to organic fluoride-based cooling compounds. The first among them was synthesized dichlorodifluoromethane, or R-12, developed in the late 1920s. In 1930, fluorocarbon refrigerants were introduced to the market and quickly became the standard. It took us [...]