PKL Goes Back to the Future!

Today, 21st October 2015, is officially "Back to the Future Day" - the date which Marty McFly and Doc Brown famously travelled to in the film. To celebrate this momentous day, we've dug out some photos from the PKL archives showing life at PKL since 1989 when the film was set. Keen to experience some time travel ourselves, we then set to work recreating some of our favourite snaps from over the years (many featuring the original staff members!)!

On the left, David (former Financial Director), Lee (current Managing Director) and Lucy (former Event Sales) carefully study an array of drawings and brochures in around 1996/7. On the right, Lee is back in his original pose, joined by Bill (Business Development) and Krista (Event Account Manager) in the same boardroom! Here's a bit of PKL trivia for you: although Lucy left the company many years ago, she's still the voice of the PKL phone system!

Operations Director Chris has barely changed since the original photo was taken in about 2003! Neither has the stairwell for that matter...

We appear to have experienced genuine time travel here! Design Manager Karsten is basically unchanged since 2004!

The photo on the left shows David, a CAD Technician and patterned-jumper connoisseur at PKL in the mid 1990s. On the right, Andre, the newest member of PKL's Design Team, recreates the classic pose.

The photo on the left was taken in the early 1990s of Christine, a Personal Assistant. Dan, one of our sales guys, stepped in to recreate this photo - all that's missing is a well-tended pot plant!

PKL's Macmillan Coffee Morning 2015

On Friday we took part in the World's Biggest Coffee Morning to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support. This is a popular event in the PKL calendar, and lots of staff brought in delicious food to sell.

We like to have a selection of sweet and savoury treats to sell, so this year we had chicken dippers, sausage rolls and crisps as well as a huge range of homemade goodies including lemon drizzle cake, cheese straws, macarons, lemon and lime slices, cherry and choc chip cookies, cupcakes and Oreo chocolate bites.



As always, the canteen was decorated with loads of bunting and balloons, and there were posters up on every door in the building!

We're very pleased to have raised a total of £87.05 for such a great cause!

Kitchens, Forklifts and Cranes: Some recent school installations

We popped down to London last week to check on the progress of two temporary school kitchen installations we were undertaking. 

Our first port of call was St Paul’s School, where our team were busy installing a large temporary kitchen complex. This facility comprises a number of our temporary units linked together, all joined to a tented dining room which the school had also hired for the duration of the project. We were also installing a range of servery equipment in the dining area, from which food will be served to pupils.



We’ve worked with the supplier of the tented dining room many times before, so the teams on site worked together to successfully complete the installation. The facility will be on site for over 12 months while the existing school kitchen undergoes major refurbishment works.

We then headed across town to Eaton House The Manor School, where a crane was being used to lift our temporary kitchen units over the buildings into the area set aside for the facility, as access was very limited. They were then moved into position using forklifts.



As with St Paul’s School, this kitchen facility will also be used while the school’s existing kitchen is refurbished. We managed to get some great photos taken from the top of the crane too, capturing the fantastic view across London!

Visit the temporary kitchens section of our website for more information on our temporary kitchen options for refurbishments.  

LACA Exhibition 2015

Last week we headed off to exhibit at the LACA Main Event in Birmingham. As well as having a stand in the main exhibition, we also took one of our Food Cubes along. We stationed the Cube outside the venue, and lots of visitors followed our special treasure maps to hunt it down for a look around!

Our lucky dip treasure chest located in the Food Cube proved to be very popular, with prizes including bags of sweets, PKL goodie bags, travel mugs, Parker pens and Kindles. Three lucky people won Kindles this year – congratulations to Phillipa, Tracey and Rachel.



As always, we had a great time meeting new people and catching up with old friends, and had some great conversations about how our KitchenPods, Food Cubes and temporary kitchens can help different schools overcome a variety of catering issues.

Recent School Projects

We've installed several temporary and permanent catering facilities in schools in the last few weeks, with many schools preparing for September already. Here's a selection of photos from some school projects we've recently completed.

Cavendish Primary School in Manchester has had a temporary kitchen and dining facility installed for 18 months while their old facilities undergo a refurbishment. The large kitchen facility has areas for preparation, production, dry and cold storage, and dishwashing, as well as a dining hall, toilets and staff room.



We've also recently installed a Food Cube at Fairfield High School for Girls in Manchester. The school wanted to offer a catering facility with a more contemporary high street feel to particularly appeal to older pupils. The Cube has helped reduce queue times in the main dining hall and has taken pressure off the catering staff. It has also proven to be popular with users of the nearby sports hall, and the Cube is generating additional profits outside of normal school hours by catering for people using the sports facilities.



The same contract caterer also ordered another identical Food Cube for Tewkesbury School (above). They have been so pleased with the popularity and success of these first two Cubes, that they've just placed an order for a third!

Sneak Preview: Meet the Space Station!

We’re really excited to give you a sneak preview of our newest product, available to hire from PKL! Meet the Space Station – a brilliant, self-contained modular servery that allows you to set up a café facility almost anywhere.

This fantastic “café on wheels” enables you to create a food retail outlet even where there is minimal space, as the clamshell construction means that it neatly folds away after use. The servery unit’s hinge mechanism also enables it to be split into two sections for hassle-free transportation.

The integrated design allows the Space Station to be ready to trade within a matter of minutes, as all the equipment and food storage is built-in and ready to use. Simply wheel it into position, unlock the unit, unfold it, and it’s ready to go!

Features include in-built refrigeration, hot or cold food display options, lockable cupboards and an in-built service line allowing you to connect a range of other equipment such as coffee machines, panini grills, soup kettles and much more.

Available with a range of equipment to choose from, the Space Station can be designed to suit your exact requirements, and the whole unit can also be fully branded with your logo and colours.

From exhibition halls and offices to hospitals and universities, the Space Station is the perfect solution for a wide range of buildings and can be used either where there is no space for a café, or to supplement your existing facilities.

If we’ve whetted your appetite, give us a ring for a chat about how hiring a Space Station could help increase your catering revenue. 

Cake Sale for the Nepal Earthquake Appeal

On Saturday 25th April a 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck Nepal, killing thousands and affecting millions of people. Many have been left with nothing, having lost their homes and having limited access to shelter, food and clean water. It will take years and millions of pounds to help put things right, so PKL staff wanted to help.

Last week we held a cake sale in the canteen, with everyone bringing in all sorts of food to sell. We raised a total of £90, which we have donated to the Disasters Emergency Committee’s Nepal Earthquake Appeal. 

The DEC incorporates 13 member agencies: Action Aid, Age International, British Red Cross, CAFOD, Care International, Christian Aid, Concern Worldwide, Islamic Relief, Oxfam, Plan UK, Save the Children, Tearfund and World Vision. In times of crisis, the DEC enables these 13 charities to collectively raise money to reach those in need quickly. The money will be spent on things like rescue operations, medical help, emergency shelters, food, clean water and blankets for people affected by the earthquake.

If you'd like to help too, you can visit the DEC website to donate.