| 27 “Our winery clientele require individual storage unique to each producer and winemaker.” T T Hugh de Lacy Cold shoulder is part of the service The company’s facilities are licensed to store everything from meat and seafood to dairy products, fruit, honey, wine and viticulture products. Marlborough: Provincial Coldstores REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT The coolest place in Marlborough for the past 32 years has to have been Provincial Coldstores in Blenheim, where everything from grapes to beef can be frozen to temperatures as low as minus 25C in the five blast freezers. Provincial Coldstores boasts two plants, one at Spring Creek and the other on the Old Renwick Road, together offering around 60,000m3 of storage. The company’s facilities are licensed to store everything from meat and seafood to dairy products, fruit, honey, wine and viticulture products. Where apple-growers were once one of the company’s core market, now wine-growers, meat processors and seafood companies make up the bulk of Provincial Coldstores’ business. During the harvest season, high value pinot noir and some chardonnay grapes are chilled overnight to reduce field heat so they can be immediately processed at the winery. Packaged wine is stored at ambient temperature until ready to ship, while export wine is hand-packed, slip-sheeted or palletised into containers destined for all parts of the world. “Our winery clientele require individual storage unique to each producer and winemaker,” general manager Donald Horton says. The main supplier of packaged beef is the ANZCO Foods, and over a period of 30 to 36 hours its products are blast-frozen prior to dispatch. The main seafood product is mussels which, along with other ocean products, are stored until shipped. “The company started out in 1990 at the Old Renwick Road site, on which the last build was completed in 2017,” Donald says. “In 1996 the first stage of the Spring Creek facility was completed to store apples, and the last build on this site was completed in 2009. “Over the years apples have all but disappeared from the province, to be replaced by grapes.” “We’re currently in the throes of phasing out the Freon we used in our refrigerating system which is now recognised as an environmental threat with a high global warming potential. “Freon is a doomed product – you won’t be able to buy it in two years and it’s become very expensive. “We’re currently retro-fitting our storage rooms to ammonia, and this involves the removal of all of our old compressors, condensers, evaporators and pipework and replacing them with an ammonia system. “We’re already well into that work; we’ve just got five blast-freezers to go, and we hope to have these completed by the end of 2023.” Provincial Coldstores, the biggest business of its kind in Marlborough, employs 13 staff at Old Renwick Road and a further five at Spring Creek. “Excellent staff are a key ingredient to our success, and we are very fortunate to maintain our loyal staff members who supply our clients with great service,” Donald says. Donald Horton has been with the company for just over 30 years, “and for all those years our focus has been the same: quality and service, combined with the experience of our long-serving staff, to provide a friendly and cost-effective service,” Donald says.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NDc2Mzg=