A display refrigerator is a critical type of equipment for your restaurant. The commercial display refrigerator showcases a variety of food, chilled drinks, pastries, and specialty items.
In this guide, you will be informed about the types, models, and functions of display refrigerators available in the restaurant market to learn which is perfect for your business.
Choosing the suitable model of display chillers for your restaurant goes beyond achieving maximum practicality and productivity. The shapes and designs of a display refrigerator also portray the type of establishment you have and influence your customers towards their purchases which drives your sales up.
Why A Display Refrigerator Is Important For Your Restaurant
Display refrigerators serve many essential goals in a restaurants logistics and management – and even marketing and branding. Designed to provide easy access and practical usage, the open display offers an attractive way for customers to choose.
Quality and efficient service in sales of restaurants are also very much attached to the sense of organization and cleanliness portrayed to customers. The display refrigerators also aid in building consumer trust, thus elevating profits.
The Display Refrigerator explained
The ‘display refrigeration’ term describes commercial fridges with an open display concept with glass doors. There are many types of display refrigerators serving many purposes. However, all open-display fridge models aim to show the best products in restaurants.
The difference between display and non-display fridges
Non-display refrigerator functions strictly as a storage device and serve to cool down the temperature of food and beverages.
This differs from how the display fridge functions, showcasing the pre-chilled products to the consumers. It also aims to provide the practicality of service for the staff.
To make the right purchase choice for your restaurant, it is essential to understand the functions, types, and features of the display refrigerator models available in the market.
What you should know before buying a Commercial Display Refrigerator
Open-display refrigerators are versatile types of equipment with many designs, sizes, and particularities of function. The decision on which model to buy for your restaurant must be based on achieving these goals:
- Increase productivity and sustain profits.
- Maintain balanced costs in energy spending and maintenance.
- Have a long-term service life.
With that in mind, its time to decide which display fridge is suitable for your restaurant.
Having it clear what the demands are will help you in this process. Those are helpful questions to ask before purchasing a display refrigerator:
- What is the intended sales volume you want to achieve?
- What is the available space of the restaurant to pick a proper size of display fridge?
- What is your restaurant style (coffee shops, delis, catered buffets, cafeteria-style buffets, etc.)?
- How many workers are on your staff?
For example: if your restaurant’s food and beverage are only served by workers behind the counter, the display refrigerator models only need to be practical for the staff´s workflow – your clients won’t interact with it.
This means the model, functions, and design have to meet the appropriate demands of the restaurant’s service logistics. This is why the number of doors and shelves, size and height, temperature range, and other functions vary in display refrigerators models.
Maybe you would like to know more about the different commercial refrigerators available.
Learning what model and type of display fridge you need
Let’s start with setting the proper storage capacity of the display refrigerators for your hospitality business, being it a coffee shop, a grab-and-go bakery, or a restaurant. This is a critical piece of information for some reasons.
If the display fridge has a bigger storage capacity than necessary, the energy consumed will be considerably higher than needed, which means more expensive – and unnecessary – energy bills.
On the contrary, if the chosen model of display refrigerator is more minor than necessary, the equipment could be damaged in the short term.
This would be due to the over-demand for the electrical panel to keep the ideal temperature running. In this case, high energy bills would be unavoidable.
In addition, this factor will undoubtedly demand more technical monitoring and repairs, which add to the monthly costs of management. The equipment´s longevity is also doomed to be shorter.
Understanding the types and models of Display Refrigerators
Display fridge models have different designs to cater to specific purposes inside a restaurant. Open-display fridge models can be as follows: under-counter and countertop open displays or upright-oriented fridge displays (this one serves a stand-alone function).
Each model is suitable for specific functions and goals in the service. The number of doors and the shapes of each also follow this rule.
Those are the types of designs available for display fridges:
The Glass Door Reach-In Types
Those are upright /stand-alone models of display refrigerators of grab-and-go items. Canned and bottled drinks and packaged food are to be placed in customer-accessible areas of restaurants.
These display fridges also called ‘merchandising refrigerators’ can have two-door styles: glass sliding doors and swinging doors. The models with self-closing doors keep the temperature stable, even within a high flux of usage.
Display glass door styles explained
When choosing display cooling models with glass sliding doors, it is essential to remember that each entry is opened at a time. This is practical for smaller rooms since they are compact and dont take up much space. Otherwise, it can disrupt the workflow.
Display food refrigerators with swinging doors are handy for consumers and provide easy access. They can either have a stay-open option, from 90 to 120 degrees or an opening outwards possibility to 180 degrees. The Tecnodom AF14PKMTNPV Stainless Steel Refrigerator is an excellent example of reversible swinging double doors.
Glass door reach-in types are prominent display pieces of equipment produced within a range of larger versions of the same models and are suitable for small and broader spaces.
Display Refrigerators for Sweets and Pastries
Display refrigerators for sweets and bakeries, or commercial cake displays, have specific measurements, designs, and functionality and come in the shape of cabinets with shelves.
They can be horizontal counter display refrigerators or upright (vertical) stand-alone, illustrating the food options and providing easy storage and prepping spaces for serving.
The Brodan Display Refrigerator SOUDA-SRDC, 90cm is a perfect example of a Cake Display Merchandiser fridge. It offers nine customization colors and a 5-sided, double glass design to make it as attractive as possible. It has a cubic shape ideal for storing cakes, pies, eclairs, sandwiches, and other refrigerated bakery products.
Its strongest features include
- 4 LED lights illuminating products for enhanced merchandising
- a visually appealing straight glass design
- adjustable 3 glass-tempered shelves and tiers that allow you to customize the unit
- Efficient refrigeration system with a lower operational cost to cater for colder storage demands
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cabinet design is engineered to meet functionality and to fulfill operational aspects and demands of practicality while maintaining temperatures between 2 to 6 degrees Celsius.
Grab-n-Go open-air display merchandising refrigerator
Not all GNG display refrigerators must have closed or front glassed doors. This type of display fridge is called an air curtain Merchandising Refrigerator. Also known as an open-air merchandiser, this display fridge type has no door.
Air curtain airflow systems in front of the open display fridges maintain the cold air in the display area – and should not make your customers get cold by standing in front.t of it. They also protect the thermal design from receiving warmer ambient air and are energy-saving.
Displays without air curtains, in comparison, consume more energy. An open-display refrigerators positioning must allow an available air gap where its placed.
Air Curtain Models for Open Display fridges
Air Curtain models can be horizontal or vertical, with a night curtain or not, and programmed for energy-saving night cover function, ensuring balanced temperatures for overnight storage.
A great design example that meets productivity and optimal product exposure in open-air display fridges is line Brodan Display Refrigerator SOUDA Grab And Go.
The open concept of this upright model maximizes product visibility while keeping the food and beverages chilled at a low operational cost. These stainless steel or Powder Coating Galvanized Steel models are an ideal choice for self-service and grab-and-go restaurants or coffee shops that want a modern design display.
There is also a set of colors of which the display fridge can be customized upon request: Zinc Yellow, Beige, Pastel orange, Tele magenta, Light blue, Copper brown, Purple red, Anthracite grey, and Grass green.
The standard colors are also available upon request: Black, White and Stainless steel, with a hairline finish.
The Cabinet Dimensions of this line (mm) have 3 variations:
- L 605 x D 755 x H 1330
- L 900 x D 753 x H 1330
- L 1500 x D 755 x H 1330
Glass Door Back Bar Refrigeration
These display fridges are placed behind the bar or the counter of restaurants, under the counter or on the top of the counter (countertop), to keep chilled beverages within easy reach for staff but still visible – and appealing – to your customers, which is also essential. These display merchandisers can be of various types.
The space factor must define the display glass door fridge type you choose for your restaurant. An upright model of a full-sized stand-alone unit is best if there is enough space behind the bench. The reason is that more area ensures more storage space, and upright glass door fridges allow for bigger model sizes.
On the other hand, under-counter or top-counter display fridges are designed to be compact-saving and great for optimizing existing counters space usage.
All these bar display fridges can feature hinged or sliding doors, which is preferable to save space and improve workflow. If the area in which the bar has display fridges gets busy often, it is recommended to invest in models that have triple-paned glass to avoid its shattering or cracking.
More productivity features for a display fridge
An environmentally friendly display fridge is also characterized by its low energy consumption, saving you money on energy. Air curtains and smart-cleaning and defrost optimization systems also keep energy bills down.
- An automatic defrost water evaporator amplifies the Air Curtain function by eliminating excess humidity.
- A digital temperature controller with an auto-defrost function saves the staff time and reduces energy consumption by achieving the goal temperature quickly.
- An internet of things (IoT) feature allows fridges to send automatized communication to the cloud and is controllable via a mobile app, with functions such as self-repair and automated service scheduling.
- Low noise levels of produced decibels can be avoided with a Hermetic compressor. This feature also promotes energy saving.
More productivity features for a display fridge
As you already know by this point, display refrigerators can come in many shapes and forms to fulfill different open-space chilling goals in restaurants.
You can find the model that best suits your needs and budget right here on ekuep’s Display refrigerators.
