H&C News meets with suppliers regularly to keep up to date with the latest product and service innovations, aiming to get the inside track on what companies offer to the market and how it is delivered.
This week, we met with David Burns, Managing Director at On-Site Kitchens Rentals to gain a better understanding of the business. On-Site Kitchens Rentals quite simply from design to installation and through to service provide absolutely everything you need in a temporary kitchen. A bold claim so we tried to look a bit closer.
1. When and where did the business start and what have been the milestones along the way?
The business was formed in early 1997 after 15 years in providing catering equipment servicing and installation it was time to move into the temporary kitchen and catering equipment hire where we saw an opportunity.
We had knowledge of the catering equipment industry and found that applying that to the temporary kitchen hire world wasn’t so difficult and was much needed. We started with a number of existing customers running the business alongside the existing service business.
From those early days we now find ourselves being filmed with Jamie Oliver and last year installed of over 600 pieces of equipment at the London Olympic Games.
2. What exactly is a temporary kitchen and what range of products and services do and offer?
Our kitchens come in a number of different sizes and variations. We have portable buildings, modular buildings, towable units, marquees and our new range the Kiosks.
Our equipment range is vast; we can cover all areas of the catering process, that’s production, preparation, servery equipment, refrigeration, ware washing and ancillaries.
Our productions range consists of 20 & 10 grid combination ovens, six burner ranges, grills, griddles, bratt pans, boiling bans, atmospheric ovens, steam ovens, fryers and much more.
In the preparation side of things we have close on everything you need to run a kitchen and prep the food, no matter how small or large.
Servery equipment is quite a popular range of our equipment as it is used in all varieties of industries to serve customers, whether it is hot or cold servery equipment you are looking for we have it.
Our refrigeration range is vast from fridges, freezers, cold rooms, blast chillers, ice machines, bench fridges, container fridges and bottle fridges we have a large stock of all. Ware washing consists of pass through dishwashers, under counter dishwashers and rack conveyors.
The ancillary range is vast for all the other equipment necessary to make sure we supply a successful temporary commercial kitchen whatever and where ever it is being used. We have 1.4 million pounds worth of equipment constantly on the move serving our customers’ across the UK.
3. What type of businesses are your customers?
Our kitchens are used by individual caterers with outside catering businesses, larger contract caterers for events and festivals, rest and nursing homes, exhibitions and retail outlets. We have fed 1300 pupils at schools for 3 years and helped the NHS to feed patients at hospitals. The Volvo Round the world sailing team used us throughout Europe and HM prisons also use us to maintain their high standards on planned refurbishments.
4. Tell us about some of the projects you feel typify how you work with customers?
The projects can be an urgent requirement like a kitchen delivered and installed recently in Edinburgh, or to manage planned refurbishments. We regularly support catering distributors of the UK when installing new kitchens in customer premises. We are often called upon by contract caterers to support their teams in temporary kitchen hire and have agreed favourable hire rates due to the volume of business that we do with them. We work on new and ground-breaking designs like the Sainsbury truck used in Christmas advertising TV commercial also providing a support vehicle and services. We also recently supplied a 5 year hire to Burnley FC to assist in their training ground requirements to feed players and staff a brief was given to supply healthy eating equipment designed to provide pasta, salads and a range of wraps.
5. Tell us about some of your people?
David Burns
David is the Founder and Managing Director of On Site Kitchen Rentals Ltd. David has vast knowledge and wealth of experience in the catering industry. Over the years his innovative thinking and management has brought On Site Kitchens to be one of the forefront suppliers of temporary kitchens and catering equipment throughout the UK.
David Turner
David is the Sales Director at On Site. David joined On-Site over six years ago having previously held several managerial positions focusing on the delivery of projects for a large Plc Company. He has an eye for detail and particularly enjoys the larger scale projects, where he can put his project management skills to good use.
Bob Horton
Bob is the head of engineering at On Site and Heads up the installation team. He has vast experience in engineering in the catering industry with over 30 years’ experience. His ability to assess a situation and deal with the problem in hand is second to none and he makes each installation a positive one making sure that the customers in always happy.
Josh Burns
Joshua is a Project Sales Manager for On Site. He has worked at On Site Kitchen Rentals Ltd now for 6 years. Over a number of years now Joshua has shown a natural flare for project management. This is a quote we received from the BBC following one of his projects. “A refreshingly straightforward install and credit to Joshua for his consideration, knowledge and customer focused approach”. BBC Television Centre, Wood Lane, London.
6. What are your future plans and any developments in the pipeline?
We are very excited about our Modex Kiosks, launched only 3 months ago but we have already seen a lot of interest from caterers. It’s a modular product that offers the client extra retail space and a very flexible approach. Modex Kiosks are building regulations approved fire rated and competitively priced, a great combination.
We very much enjoyed meeting David and taking a look at the business and like David we also look forward to seeing the development of the Modex Kiosks.
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