Mezzanine Floors, Pallet Racking systems, Office Partitions - Installers & Suppliers UK

MEZZ-RACK SYSTEMS were approached by a Cold Store Manager in Somerset and invited to tender for a racking installation project that had to be supplied and installed within a very tight timescale.

Requirements

A footprint and side elevation of the proposed cold store was submitted and our brief was, basically, to design a system that could fully maximize the potential of the building. On discussing the product (meat product) with the Branch Manager it was clear to us that 100% selectivity of product was not important because of its long shelf life, but speed of retrieval was very important. He stated to us that he hoped to store approx. 2500 pallets.

On scaling the drawing we were immediately confused as to why he only expected 2500 pallets as we believed we could almost double the quantity with a Drive-In / Thru Racking System.

We submitted our tender and within a few days we were contacted by the Manager who thanked us for our effort and design but also said that our price was not competitive with the other 2 tenders he had received. We asked him if the tenders were ‘like for like’ and he said “no, but I get the impression you are trying to sell me something I do not need”. We suggested a no obligation (600 mile) round trip visit to site and on arrival we were introduced to 3 Co Directors who admitted to being naïve about warehouse distribution and racking systems design.

It did however, transpire that the other 2 suppliers that had tendered for the project had simply designed a straight-forward wide aisle pallet racking system and this is where they arrived at the 2,500 pallet stored. (Apparently, "It was not possible to supply a Drive-In Racking system in the 6 weeks time frame"!). We did however, quote 4 weeks delivery and it was, in fact, our competitors who were quoting for “something they do not need, or insufficient for their requirements”.

We spent 3 hours with the client, discussing other possible designs, but concluded that our design was “exactly what they were looking for”. The 4800 pallets locations that we offered was 20% over their expectation but they at least had an allowance for increase in stock.

We were awarded the contract to the value of £144,000 on the spot because we offered the right design, within the right time scale. The price, however, was way above their initial budget because they had been previously ‘misled’.

Outcome

SUPERBUILD Drive-In Racking was supplied and installed within the time scale and agreed budget.

The SUPERBUILD can be finished in hot dipped galvanized or painted RAL and is ideal for Cold Store environments.

Project 2:
STORAX DRIVE-IN RACKING – CHESHIRE

An existing customer of MEZZ-RACK SYSTEMS placed an order for the installation of 3,500 pallet locations of STORAX Pallet Racking. Their existing pallets weighed 1000 kgs but we had to allow for a new designed pallet load of 1500 kgs., which they would be using within the year. The system - Adjustable Pallet Racking for a standard reach truck aisle operation - was installed. Our customer called us last year and notified us that they were expecting twice as many pallets than 1500 k.

Selectivity of product from the racks was not essential and MEZZ-RACK SYSTEMS was able to design a STORAX Drive-In Racking System accommodating 7,800 pallets. Although the current system was Standard Pallet Racking, our design team realised that by using the existing frames (designed initially to take double its weight) we were able to utilise a great deal of the existing product.

Outcome

A contract for £171,600 was awarded and MEZZ-RACK SYSTEMS installed 6 blocks of STORAX Drive-In Racking, 1300 pallets per block. This was installed within a very tight schedule and within their budget. We are now looking forward to installing their next phase of 6,000 pallets.