Launched two years ago, Daikin’s Conveni-pack integrated refrigeration, air conditioning and heating system is beco.ming a popular choice for convenience stores.
WITH consumers demanding a more diverse range of locally-available fresh foods, the convenience store market is widening its product offering and experiencing an upward trend in sales.

Garage forecourt shops are also looking to maximise sales of fresh food to further increase profits traditionally attained solely from fuel sales. Fresh take-out food, coffee shops/café areas, groceries and alcohol, are now forming a more complete customer product offering in forecourt mini-marts throughout the country.

According to Daikin UK, this demand for convenient, good quality food has seen a significant increase in demand for its Conveni-pack integrated refrigeration, air conditioning and heating system.

Launched two years ago for convenience stores ranging in size from 1500 to 6000ft2, Conveni-pack has been designed to take available heat from one area of the convenience store (fresh food cabinets as an example) and duct it to other parts of the building. The Conveni-pack system also has the capacity to work 'in reverse' and can deliver cool chilled air throughout the store.

Since its launch, Conveni-pack has been installed by many well known food retailers including The Co-op, Aldi and Budgens. The Co-operative Group has around 75 sites with Conveni-pack systems, with plans for expanding this roll-out.

In an economic climate which looks set to see energy prices continue to rise, Daikin sees Conveni-pack's integrated solution, with its claimed energy savings of up to 50% compared to traditional non-integrated systems, becoming the preferred choice.

Support

Daikin offers complete design and installation support with the Conveni-pack, including on site QA visit and system commissioning. Data monitoring of all critical parameters comes as standard.
A single Conveni-pack can provide 17kW of refrigeration, 15kW of ac cooling and 25kW of heating.

With space a scarce commodity in many stores, shop owners benefit from the fact that the Conveni-pack external unit measures just 2.2m2.

Quiet

The Conveni-pack can also overcome noise concerns. The system has been produced to run with minimum levels of noise and is aided by the inclusion of inverter-driven scroll compressors with sound suppressing jackets. In a recent Co-op refurbishment in Budleigh Salterton, Devon, Conveni-pack was the only system available which could satisfy the strict building restrictions and noise pollution legislation, and yet provide the required refrigeration duty.

For larger stores an integrated solution like Conveni-pack can be used to capitalise on the heat available from numerous fresh food chiller cabinets. The James Graven group installed Daikin's Conveni-pack in its 6,500ft2 Budgen store in Dersingham, Norfolk.

The owner demanded a solution that could reduce the energy cost for the new store by between 25 to 35% while providing a comfortable whole store environment all year round. The company also wanted to free up space in the old very large plant room for future store development.

It was decided subsequently that Conveni-pack would be responsible for providing 100% of the stores heating needs all year round, thus doing away with the old gas heating system.

The heat generated from the fresh food chilled cabinets was re-distributed by Conveni-pack using its heat recovery and inverter technology to heat the whole store via warm air distribution cassettes, over door controlled air blower units and newly installed air ducting.