A new air-bridge will connect Woolworths new fresh food distribution centre to its meat supplier’s facility in Melbourne’s West, enabling faster and fresher supply of produce to Victorians.
Retail specialist Mainbrace Constructions will facilitate a contract valued at approximately $2 million to deliver a vital piece of infrastructure for Hilton Foods in Truganina, which in turn supports the development of an adjacent fresh food distribution centre for Woolworths.
A new air-bridge will connect the Woolworths and Hilton Foods facilities, and Mainbrace will facilitate the connection on the Hilton Foods side, coordinating the internal link between the new air-bridge with the existing dispatch area.
Hilton Foods currently leases a facility at Truganina from which it processes, packages and organises the supply of high-quality fresh meat around Victoria for Woolworths.
Woolworths is currently building a new fresh food distribution centre adjacent to the existing Hilton Foods facility.
Concurrently, Mainbrace has been engaged in a Health Safety, Environment and Quality Supervisory Role for internal works in the Hilton Foods Facility, which are being undertaken by Vanderlande.
Vanderlande originally installed, and is currently servicing and maintaining, all the robotics and automation equipment within the Hilton Foods facility. As part of these new internal works, Vanderlande will provide new automation including an updated platform in the load-out area of the facility.
Craig Dunlop, Mainbrace VIC Interiors Manager said the project shows how the company is supporting its clients at different stages in the retail supply chain to help them achieve new efficiencies in their operations.
“We have coordinated a detailed construction program in the context of a live food production and dispatch environment, in collaboration with the logistics team to sequence work to suit inbound and outbound times,” he said.
Mainbrace has delivered multiple projects nationally for Woolworths over the years, from new stores to refurbishments and upgrades.
Mainbrace’s role in the collaborative project is multi-layered and commenced in an Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) capacity with Woolworths which included the design, cost planning, construction methodology and programming.
“Early Contractor Involvement is a service which enables us to work with clients at the conceptual phase of a project, in order to value engineer an optimal solution that we know, based on our experience, will be efficiently deliverable once the project moves to the construction phase,” Craig said.
The collaborative program of works is scheduled for completion in 2021.