A Snapshot of PKL’s 2015: Part 1

In such a busy company, it's impossible to tell you everything we've been up to this year, so instead we've picked just one photo to represent each month of 2015, to give you a quick snapshot of our year! Here's Part 1 - January to June. Part 2 to follow soon...



January - ExtensionPods Launch
In January, we introduced our range of “ExtensionPods” – modular buildings which can be joined onto existing buildings as an alternative to a traditional extension. They can be used to create an open plan space, or be kept as separate rooms with their own doors. The range includes the KitchenPod, PrepPod, DishwashPod, StoragePod and LaundryPod, each offering bespoke options to suit your requirements.



February – Food Cube Diner at Stratford-upon-Avon School
February saw the installation of our first ever Food Cube Diner – a Food Cube with integrated dining room – at Stratford-upon-Avon School. The Food Cube Diner was built to ease pressure on the main canteen when the school moved from a double to a single lunch hour and introduced a “stay on site” policy. The diner is used exclusively by Year 11, but it also has an external serving hatch available for use by other year groups. The dining room is also used by clubs and as an exam hall when not in use.



March – New Event Kitchens Website
In March we launched our brand new event kitchens website, dontforgetthekitchen.com. This website is designed specifically for our event clients and offers an instant online estimate system as well as access to details of all our kitchens and equipment for hire, case studies, and health and safety information. It also gives access to crockery, cutlery and glassware from our partners at Well Dressed Tables.



April – Large Scale Temporary Prison Kitchen 
We undertook a large scale modular kitchen project for a prison client in April, who needed a 6-month temporary kitchen solution during a major refurbishment. Comprising 35 kitchen units, and with a footprint of over 500m2, the facility was initially constructed at PKL (construction phase shown above!), with the mechanical and electrical fit-out taking place here as well as the extraction and equipment installation. It was then disassembled into individual units, delivered and re-built at the client’s site ready to go.



May – Cake Sale for Nepal Earthquake Appeal 
At the beginning of May we held a cake sale to raise money for the Nepal Earthquake Appeal. Throughout the year, we also held fundraising events for Comic Relief, Macmillan Cancer Support, the Royal British Legion and Children in Need, raising a total of over £365 for charity.



June – Temporary Kitchens at Cavendish Primary School
In June, we installed a temporary kitchen and dining facility at Cavendish Primary School in Manchester. As well as areas for preparation, production, dry and cold storage, and dishwashing, the large facility also features a dining hall, staff room and toilets. It will be on site for 18 months while the school’s old facilities undergo a major refurbishment.

New Event Kitchens Website!

We’re excited to introduce you to our brand new event kitchens website:

DontForgetTheKitchen.com

For too long, event kitchens have been forgotten about. They may not be the most exciting element to organise, but leaving your kitchen arrangements until the last minute is a terrible idea – you risk items not being available, higher prices, and lots of unnecessary stress!

Our new website is designed to make planning and booking your event kitchen and catering equipment hire a much easier and more enjoyable process, and to hopefully encourage you to not leave it until the last minute!

Dontforgetthekitchen.com features our fantastic new online estimate system, which allows you to add kitchen units and catering equipment to a basket, customise your hire with additional services, and get an instant online estimate. The website also enables you to request a quote for crockery, cutlery and glassware from our friends over at Well Dressed Tables, who we’ve teamed up with to offer a more comprehensive solution to our event customers.

We supply events of any size, so whether you need a few items of catering equipment or a huge temporary kitchen facility, we can help.

The other big news in the events sector at the moment is the introduction of the new CDM Regulations in April this year, which will result in a higher level of safety standards for the events industry. We’re experts in event kitchen health and safety, and we’ve already been supplying CDM compliant products and services for the last five years! The new website has a whole section dedicated to event health and safety, so you can read up on all our different accreditations and find out how the new CDM Regulations will affect your event.

Pop over to dontforgetthekitchen.com now to see our full range of kitchens, equipment and services, get an instant estimate, read some weird and wonderful case studies, and find out more about event health and safety.

But whatever you do… Don’t forget the kitchen!

New Brochures!

Today is a momentous day here at PKL - after months of hard work, the last of our 5 new brochures has been delivered from the printers!

From Temporary Kitchens, Catering Equipment and Event Kitchens, to Permanent Kitchens and PKL Transworld, no matter what your requirement, we've got a shiny new brochure to give you all the info you need. We've also got a brilliant new folder to keep the brochures together, featuring a useful insert which gives a company overview and information on our service and accreditations. They all have that lovely new brochure smell too. What more could you want, eh?

To order a brochure, please visit our website here or give us a call.

Health and Safety Changes in the Event Industry

The PKL Event Hire Team:
Manager Krista with Sales Executives Ciaran and Dan

In this post, PKL’s Event Hire Team blog about changes in event health and safety legislation and highlight the importance of ensuring your event is compliant.

Recent changes to legislation will see an increased focus on health and safety standards at events throughout the UK. These changes are being supported by the Events Industry Forum, the Concert Promoters Association, the AEV Catering Working Group, Thames Water, WaterSafe and the HSE.

We know that there is sometimes a pressure to focus on minimising costs during the installation of catering equipment or temporary kitchens, but can you afford to run the risk of spot fines due to unsafe practices, having your venue closed during your event, or even assume legal responsibility for a non-compliant venue that goes wrong?

In this blog post, we’ll outline some of the key things you need to know when organising catering facilities for events.
                                                                                                          
What’s Going On?

The introduction of the new Construction Design Management (CDM) Regulations in October 2014 will mean a higher level of safety standards for the events industry, similar to those seen within the construction sector. Venue owners and event organisers will often see the legal liability for compliance falling to them as the main contractor, and unless managed carefully, will be liable for any wrongdoings by subcontractors working on an event.

How can PKL help? PKL has supplied temporary catering facilities to large construction companies for many years and, as a result, we are fully compliant with CDM regulations. In fact, we’ve already been supplying a CDM compliant product and service to the events sector for over five years!

Water Supply Regulations

It is the duty of event organisers or venue managers installing plumbing systems or water fittings to ensure that they are compliant with Water Supply Regulations. It’s important to comply with these regulations in order to ensure that equipment doesn’t contaminate the local water supply or use an unnecessary amount of water. Penalties for non-compliance are severe and can result in an event being closed down.

How can PKL help? We’ve recently undertaken a complete review of our fleet of catering equipment and temporary kitchens to ensure that they are Water Supply Regulations compliant.


Who Enforces the Legislation?

Health and Safety Executive – The HSE will have more power to issue spot fines and even stop the build-up and breakdown of an event until safe practices have been put in place.

Fire and Rescue Authorities – Individual authorities will have the power to enforce fire safety legislation.

Local Authorities – Local councils, often represented by Environmental Health Officers, will have the power to enforce health and safety measures.

Never Fear, PKL is Here!

Over the last few years, we have dedicated a large amount of time and resource into ensuring that our product and service complies with all relevant health and safety legislation. We have taken into account advice and guidance published in all the key events health and safety documents, including:

• The Purple Guide
• The Association of Event Organisers eGuide
• The Chartered Institute of Environmental Health National Guide for Outdoor and Mobile Catering
• NCASS Guidance for the Installation of LPG and LPG Fired Equipment in Catering Trailers, Converted Vehicles, Portable Kitchens, Carts, Trolleys and Bikes
• UKLPG information sheets

This means you can be confident that from our equipment to our installation service, we comply with all relevant regulations. As with any reputable company, we can, of course, also provide you with hard evidence (certification, forms, and all the official documentation) to prove that we are fully compliant – just ask when you book and we’ll be happy to provide you with copies. Asking your suppliers for this kind of evidence is very important, as all suppliers should be able to back up their health and safety claims with the correct documentation.

Need help? If you’re worried and need any advice on how to ensure your event complies with these health and safety standards, please just get in touch, as we are experts in this area. We also work with consultants who can provide you with a full health and safety audit for your event.

For more information on our event kitchen hire and catering equipment hire, please visit our website.

Happiness at PKL

Today is the second annual International Day of Happiness! You might remember that last year, we listed some reasons why PKL is happy. Well, we're back again this year, explaining why we are still happy! We asked a few PKL staff members what's making them happy in their departments at the moment:

"The summer is fast aproaching, which will be busy but really exciting for us, with our equipment heading off to events all over the country!" Krista, Event Hire Team

"We're very proud and happy that our colleague Lee successfully survived his parachute jump in aid of Brain Tumour Research!" Andrea, Finance

"Our reception area has just had a complete facelift, with new paint and flooring as well as a new trophy cabinet, TV screen and reception desk!" Pat, Business Support

Reception before (top) and after (bottom)

"We've had some fantastic feedback and happy customers in Dubai following our new partnership with Lowe Refrigeration." Peter, PKL Transworld

"I'm happy because we've just added a new member to the CAD team to help with all the exciting new projects we're working on at the moment!" Karsten, Kitchen Design Team

"After months of hard work, our brand new range of hire guide brochures is in the process of being printed!" Sam, Marketing

Our new hire guide brochures being printed

"I'm happy that I had the opportunity to go and watch the filming of The One Show when our KitchenPods and Food Cubes were featured on it!" Ian, Permanent Kitchens Team

"We're happy because we've received a 92% customer satisfaction rating for quality and technical support this year!" John, Kit Heaven and Manisha, Technical Support

Tackling the Trends: Pop-Up Restaurants

In this blog post, Dan from our Events team chats about pop-up restaurants and how PKL can help make them a success.

The Trend
Pop-up restaurants have been a huge trend in the UK over the past couple of years, especially in the summer months. They are great for boosting business to existing restaurants or showcasing artistic cooking events. For businesses, they provide a high-profile way to trial new menus, raise money for charity, highlight a current promotion or experiment with new dining concepts. These exclusive short-term restaurant events are often used for business to create a buzz and generate positive PR. For customers, it provides an exciting, exclusive dining experience, the chance to try new things, and often the opportunity to try dining in a new and unusual location.

How Can PKL Help?
Catering Equipment: There are over 10,000 items of commercial catering equipment in our hire fleet, ready to turn your pop-up restaurant kitchen into a high quality, professional standard kitchen.

Mobile Canopies: Since many pop-up restaurants take place in buildings or structures which are not designed to be used as kitchens, our mobile canopies can easily be installed to help turn any space into a fully-functioning, compliant kitchen. Incorporating an automatic fire-suppression system, automatic gas shut off system and full length extraction canopy, our mobile canopies enable you to install professional foodservice equipment just about anywhere!

Temporary Kitchens: If the venue for your pop-up restaurant doesn’t have any space for a kitchen inside, we can supply one of our portable kitchen units, which is a self-contained commercial kitchen unit all set up with catering equipment of your choice.

PKL Expertise
Warehouses, disused tram sheds, marquees, shopping centre roofs, underground tunnels – you name it, we’ve set up a kitchen in it! When it comes to pop-up restaurants, we have a huge amount of experience. Just tell us what you’re hoping to achieve, and we can guide you through the process, from selecting appropriate catering equipment for your menu requirements, to ensuring you have the right extraction in place to meet health and safety requirements.

The Proof is in the Pudding
Here are a couple of my favourite pop-up restaurant projects that we’ve worked on:

The Decorators: This was primarily an art and architecture-based project, which saw a pop-up restaurant created on a scaffolding structure in a derelict area of Ridley Road Market in Dalston, London. Guest chefs created different daily menus using only market produce, and diners shared a communal table high above the market. The meals were prepared on the ground floor kitchen then raised by a mechanical table up to the guests on the first floor. We provided a six burner, double bowl sink with hand wash, two door fridge, and a water heater for the full three weeks of the project.

Frieze Art Fair: We worked with the artists and managers at Frieze London 2012 to help bring art and food preparation together at the world’s most influential contemporary art fair. Several leading London restaurants hosted different dining areas, with each kitchen having its own specific requirements. Equipment we supplied included solid top stoves, hot cupboards, upright fridges and freezers, servery equipment and preparation tables.

How PKL can help with your event

In this post, Dan from our Events team blogs about some of our events experience and why you should consider using PKL for temporary kitchens and catering equipment at your event.

Organising an event can be quite a daunting experience! To make your event a success, there are a huge number of things you’ll need to consider and suppliers you’ll need to deal with.

On top of this, you only get one chance to get it right, so organising any areas you’re unsure about can be risky. The organisation of temporary catering facilities can be one of those areas, and getting this part wrong could be disastrous and leave you in trouble with your caterers, guests and even the authorities if not done properly.

Don’t worry though – as a member of the Events team at PKL, I know the kind of challenges you’ll be up against and I have plenty of experience in offering advice and supplying temporary catering facilities and catering equipment to all sorts of different events.
So, that’s one less thing you need to worry about!

Don’t just take my word for it though. Here’s a list of a few ways in which we can help, showing exactly why you should consider using PKL for temporary kitchens at your event. 

Proven Experience
We have over 20 years’ experience in providing temporary kitchens and catering equipment for events throughout the UK and around the world. In fact, PKL has been doing this since before I was born!

I regularly work to supply catering equipment and facilities to festivals, sporting events, conferences, exhibitions, product launches and pop up restaurants amongst others, for both front and back of house facilities. Recent projects I’ve worked on have included temporary kitchens for a number of locations at Frieze Art Fair, catering equipment for back of house use at the Brit Awards and pop up kitchens for the 'Last Supper Club' event in London. Last summer, PKL also provided 150 separate temporary kitchens for venues, back of house, public and hospitality catering at London 2012.

Equipment and Flexibility
We have the widest range of commercial, bulk and specialist catering equipment available in Europe with over 9,000 items in our hire fleet. This enables us to provide flexible solutions to meet your requirements, so whether you’re planning a standard menu for a large number of people or a bespoke menu for a specialist pop up restaurant, I can help plan a temporary catering facility and provide commercial equipment that is right for you.

For large scale catering, our panless kitchen solution using Gastronorm compatible ovens, refrigeration equipment, hot cupboards and servery equipment is often an ideal solution. We also have specialist facilities which I can advise you on, which enable us to construct temporary kitchens within existing buildings or inside marquees safely and in a compliant way.

Innovative Kitchen Design
Clients often approach us with weird and wonderful ideas for new event kitchen concepts. These have resulted in some of my favourite hires, so whether your temporary kitchen needs to be on top of a busy shopping centre or in Victorian tunnels underground, our experienced in-house design team are up for the challenge! Our kitchen designers can work with you to provide a facility that fits your needs and menu, and the requirements of your chosen location.

Preparation, Delivery and Installation
All our equipment goes through rigorous testing and inspection before each hire, as the last thing you want is for your kitchen to become inoperable during your event! Each item of equipment is put through a commissioning process and quality assurance check, and our temporary kitchens undergo a 30 stage pre-delivery inspection.

Our in-house transport team and engineers are vastly experienced in delivering and installing kitchen solutions, not only in the UK, but around the world. Our engineers hold a wealth of health and safety accreditations to ensure your kitchen is installed in a safe and compliant manner.

Technical Support
We understand that often there’s only one chance to get it right at an event, and operations can’t stop for any reason. To make sure your event runs smoothly, all our equipment and kitchens come backed with 24 hour technical support, and we can also offer the services of a 'babysitting engineer' to stay on site at your event if required.

Help in Specifying Other Products
Sometimes, you might require more than just catering facilities, and although we don’t supply them directly, I can help you source water and waste, marquees, furniture, power generators and gas. Our 25 years supplying event kitchens means that PKL has a vast knowledge of the industry so I can also recommend suppliers for many different aspects of your event if you are struggling for ideas on where to go.

PKL is happy!

Today is the first United Nations International Day of Happiness. We are naturally happy people here at PKL, so we thought we'd share a few reasons why PKL is such a happy place!

A very happy portable kitchen unit

1. We are saving the planet, one eKitchen at a time! Well, we might not be singlehandedly "saving the planet", but our eKitchens are certainly doing their bit. With a number of energy-saving features, these portable kitchens are seriously energy-efficient compared to standard units, and help our customers reduce both their energy useage and costs. We'd say that's a great reason to be happy!

2. Our KitchenPods and Food Cubes are helping schools to provide hot school meals to pupils, keep them on site at lunchtimes, and improve pupils' diets. Happy, well-fed pupils can lead to better behaviour and concentration, which leads to happy teachers, which in turn leads to happy schools. Loads of happiness for everyone! Job done.

3. Our temporary portable kitchens get invited to loads of amazing events. From the Olympics, to pop-up restaurants, to festivals to film sets, our kitchens are on the guest list! One of our kitchens even travels around the world with Cirque Du Soleil! Our kitchens are very proud to produce food for all these fantastic events, which makes them very happy indeed.

4. The staff at PKL are all very happy. All our hard work over the years has resulted in us being presented with lots of lovely awards. It's great to know that people appreciate what we do, so we're all very happy. Well, apart from the poor person who has to dust all the awards each week..!

Events: The early bird catches the worm!

If there's one thing I've learnt during my time working on the hire of UK event kitchens, it's that there's no such thing as booking too early! For the summer months and festive season especially, it's important to book your kitchen facilities early, as leaving it too late can risk the facilities you need being unavailable. Booking early can also make sure we have enough time to design your kitchen to your exact requirements and offer you the very best options for your needs.

But what type of kitchen is best for you?

This will usually boil down to a choice between Portable Kitchen Units and Marquee Kitchens. Both have their own different advantages, and a big part of my job is advising customers on the best type of kitchen facility to suit their event. Here's a really brief overview of the two key options which would be used as a starting point for designing your ideal temporary event kitchen.

Portable Kitchen Units

• Hygienic, purpose-designed, food-safe unit
• Built-in extraction canopies and fire supression
• Sturdy, high-quality unit
• Can be joined to other units such as dishwash units, coldrooms, etc to form a larger kitchen complex
• Choice of catering equipment inside

Marquee Kitchens

• Over 10,000 items of commercial catering equipment available to hire, ideal for setting up kitchen facilities within marquees
• Specially designed mobile canopies (with full-length extraction canopy and fire supression system) can be used to install catering equipment inside marquees and existing buildings such as exhibition centres and warehouses 
• Very flexible option
• Clear flow through the kitchen due to being able to set up different areas for preparation, production, dishwash etc

For both of these options, I can advise you on the catering equipment you might require, and the best option for your specific event. This is another reason why it's so important to book in plenty of time - the longer we have until the event, the more time we have to plan the ideal kitchen to meet your requirements, and the more likely it is that the exact facilities and equipment you need will be available.

This makes now the ideal time to be thinking about booking catering facilities for your summer events, festivals, pop-up restaurants and even Christmas events! Feel free to get in touch with me for a chat about your upcoming events and I'll be happy to advise you on the perfect PKL facilities for your needs.