Stainless Wire Shelves used for medical drug storage in a temperature regulated room

Maximizing Cold Room Storage Space With High-Capacity Shelving

Cold room storage spaces are designed to keep items at desired temperatures to help prolong their lifetime. Industries such as pharmaceuticals, police evidence departments, and beverage distributors rely heavily on cold storage for preservation. Once cold rooms have been set up, companies will typically turn to static shelving units to organize their inventory. However, immobile shelving units cannot be adjusted. As a result, organizing stock is time-consuming and inefficient. Companies are then having to invest in more floor space to make up for the inefficiencies of using more permanent shelves.

Southwest Solutions Group® provides mobile, high capacity racks and shelves to the chemical and pharmaceutical, beverage distributor, food distributor, and police evidence industries with temperature regulated cold rooms, areas, and freezers. By supplying these industries with our storage solutions, we aim to help reduce overall costs. Installing our versatile racking systems to your existing pallet racks will help you reduce used floor space by 50% or more.

While maximizing your floor space can provide more room for increased product storage, installing our mobile racking systems can also lead to:

  • Enhanced mobility and ease of stock rotation: quickly find the shelving unit(s) you need.
  • Increased productivity and organization: make the most of your employees’ time by arranging your shelving units strategically.
  • Reduced risk of cross-contamination: effortlessly organize items that may be raw or high-risk in separate areas.
  • Easier cleaning and maintenance of your cold room storage space: gain trouble-free access to your products to ensure the area is well kept.

Chemical and pharmaceutical companies

Certain pharmaceuticals must stay at colder temperatures. Drugs that require these conditions are meant to be kept at 46-49 degrees Fahrenheit, while medicines that need even colder temperatures must be kept around 35-49 degrees Fahrenheit. Storing drugs in these conditions reduces the chances of them weakening, becoming ineffective, and at times, unsafe. Proper storage, with appropriate shelving, increases profit potential and decreases overall expenditures.

 

Beverage Distributors

There are many regulations and distributor obligations associated with the beverage industry. For alcoholic, canned, or bottled beverages to keep their shelf-life, they should be stored in a temperature-regulated area to prevent them from spoiling.

Your company can dramatically increase efficiency by using our mobile units in your cold room spaces. How? Our shelving units help you: control stock rotation, maintain proper inventory numbers, and use floor space more effectively.

Read more here about our mobile pallet racking system for keg storage.

Food Distributors

cold room meat storageIn the food industry, items such as meats, fruits, and vegetables must be stored in ideal temperatures to maintain freshness. The primary focus of food storage is to safeguard goods from not only spoiling but also preventing any food-borne diseases from spreading. This helps keep the health-benefits (like boosting our immunities) associated with consuming fresh foods. For most perishable items, the best temperature to instill freshness is 40 degrees Fahrenheit or lower. Dry goods, on the other hand, should be kept around 50-59 degrees Fahrenheit.

With the right shelving units in place, food distributors can store more products. This means that you can buy more items in bulk at reduced costs.

Read more here about how our compact moving shelf racks promote space savings.

Police Evidence Departments

Cold rooms are essential in preserving biological evidence in police departments. Warmer temperatures can cause proof, such as DNA, to break down and deteriorate. To keep such valuable items safe, storing temperatures should range from 36 to 46 degrees Fahrenheit. Proper storing of this evidence also reduces the risk of contamination.

Using cooler temperatures to preserve evidence helps maintain the accurate reading and testing of DNA if a case needs to be re-opened. By installing our high capacity shelving units, your departments can easily access evidence with the push of a button.

Read more here about how to save space when storing biological evidence in temperature-controlled rooms.

Cutting Costs With Effective Storage Shelving

Industries using and planning temperature regulated cold rooms and freezers face two expensive problems – the high cost associated with building these rooms, and the costs of maintaining them. Let’s take a look at these two obstacles and the solutions we provide in more depth:

The high price to build temperature-controlled cold storage rooms and freezers

walk in beer cooler shelvingFirst, we all know that space is expensive, and building temperature regulated cold storage rooms and freezers is even more pricey. To help you better understand the concept, let’s compare costs: Building warehouse storage spaces can range from $50 to $75 per square foot depending on location, insulation, and materials. A cold storage warehouse runs anywhere from $140 to $200 per square foot.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, 52% of energy costs go towards maintaining a cold storage warehouse. That’s far more than compared to 2% for non-refrigerated warehouse spaces.

What it costs to maintain them

In the commercial industry, cold storage rooms have one of the highest energy consumption rates. On average, 25 kWh of electricity and 9200 BTU of natural gas per square foot is used. Refrigerating the room alone calls for 70% of your entire electricity bill.

With this high cost, it’s essential to make sure the refrigeration systems are adequately maintained and insulated to prevent energy costs from increasing.

The refrigeration system needs to always be in good working condition to guarantee the preservation of items. To keep the temperature at a desirable level, it’s vital to regularly clean the refrigerator’s compressor, fan coils, condenser, and evaporators.

Saving you money with high capacity shelving

temperature controlled pharmaceutical storageThe costs associated with building and maintaining cold storage spaces are high. So, using every square inch of your cold room is very important. At Southwest Solutions Group®, we have set out to help you achieve this with our high capacity shelving units.

While reducing floor space is a crucial component, here are some other advantages you will gain from our mobile shelving units:

  • Reduced overall costs: Saving floor by using vertical space results in more room for items and less need to rent more space. Having a densely packed room also decreases the price per pallet stored.
  • Increased work accuracy & employee productivity: With mobile racking systems in place, employees can easily access the products they need. By only moving the shelves apart or in and out of aisles, you can gain more control of how your inventory is organized.
  • Improved employee morale: Easier access to stock helps staff find products quicker, which increases productivity and reduces frustration.
  • Saved time: By organizing mobile racks strategically, you will know exactly where everything is. This will keep your employees time searching through aisles trying to locate individual shelves.
  • Increased room efficiency: the fuller and more compact the cold room space is, the more effective the refrigeration system becomes. This also helps reduce overhead costs.

Work with us to save valuable floor space, make room for more inventory, and save time and money in the process.

More About Our High Capacity Racks & Shelves

High Capacity Storage Shelves in a Museum Temperature Regulated Cold Room

At Southwest Solutions Group®, our primary goal is to help companies like yours reduce costs and increase efficiency. From our mobile cold room racking to our cold room storage shelves, we have the unique products you need to optimize and transform your storage space.

So, how do our high capacity storage racks and cold room storage shelves help to cut costs? The systems reduce costs associated with building and maintaining temperature regulated cold rooms and freezers by maximizing the floor space.

Maximizing temperature regulated cold room and freezer floor space with high capacity storage racks, and shelves consist of converting fixed aisles into moveable aisles. This is accomplished by putting rows of racks or shelves onto moving platforms that roll back and forth on floor tracks. Rows of racks and shelves move on tracks with the simple push of a button (powered systems) or turn of a three-spoke handle (hand-crank systems).

Typically, high capacity storage racks and shelves have one moveable aisle for every six static aisles, but it all depends on the cold chain activity level of your facility.

Converting your cold room or freezer space to include high capacity storage racks and shelves will condense your storage area by 50% to 60%. This is done by installing our mobile racks under your pallet racks. All of your static shelving units will become mobile. Your floor space will increase as you can move and adjust your shelves accordingly. The flexibility can drastically reduce the wasted aisle space, making more room for inventory.

Click here to view high capacity storage shelves

Design and Installation Services for High Capacity Storage Racks and Shelves

Southwest Solutions Group® provides design and installation services for high capacity storage racks and shelves for temperature regulated cold storage rooms and freezers. Contact us by phone at 1-800-803-1083 or send us a message, and we will put you in touch with your local representative.

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