24/7 staffed refrigeration alarm monitoring for grocers

24/7 alarm monitoring case study, food retail store

A freezer failed before dawn. No product was lost.

A critical freezer alarm before 5 a.m. reached people who could act. Staff moved the product while the contractor restored refrigeration.

Download the two-page study (PDF)
Zero

product lost in this freezer failure

Before 5 a.m.

when the critical freezer alarm came in

24/7

staffed Kalder alarm desk

Store + contractor

both brought in by the alarm desk

A freezer failure before 5 a.m., answered in minutes.

CriticalCriticalNormal1234-10°0°10°20°30°4:006:008:0010:0012:0014:00
  1. Alarm. Kalder calls the store.
  2. Product moved. Contractor called.
  3. Contractor on site.
  4. Freezer restored. Product back.
The shaded area is time above the critical setpoint. Staff moved the product at marker 2, before it reached unsafe temperatures. Redrawn from the case study PDF; a reconstruction, not raw data.
First page of Case Study 03: Alarm Notification and Escalation (PDF)The two-page field studyDownload the PDFKalder by Neelands

The problem.

A freezer lost temperature control before the store opened. An alarm on its own would not move the product or fix the freezer. It needed to reach someone who could act.

What happened.

  1. The alarm reaches a person. The freezer crossed its critical high-temperature setpoint. Kalder’s alarm desk called the customer directly.
  2. Product moves; the contractor is called. Store staff moved the product into working refrigeration while Kalder got the service contractor responding.
  3. Product goes back once the freezer holds. The contractor diagnosed and repaired the fault. Product went back once the freezer was holding temperature. None was lost.

The result.

The alarm was acted on because a person saw it and made the calls. Monitoring started the response; store staff and the contractor finished it.

How the numbers were worked out.

Zero product loss is the reported outcome for this event. The inventory value at this store isn’t stated, so we don’t claim a dollar figure for loss avoided. The temperature chart in the PDF is a representative reconstruction. Response times depend on the contacts and escalation plan agreed for each store. The customer’s name is withheld. Results are specific to this operation.

Seeing the same problem in your stores?

We’ll look at your equipment, your alarm response and what it would take to catch this earlier.