Thermo King presented Sheetz Inc., an Altoona, Pa.-based, family-owned convenience restaurant chain operation, with the “Energy Efficiency Leader Award” in recognition of its outstanding efforts to increase the company’s environmentally sound practices.
Sheetz is the first ever convenience retail chain to win the award.
Sheetz took delivery of a customized delivery fleet of 52 Thermo King multi-temperature Sprinter vans in 2012, saving the company more than 148,000 gallons of diesel fuel annually compared to conventional box delivery.
Sheetz says its Sprinter van fleet travels 5.6 million miles a year, making 160,000 deliveries.
The vans support the company’s distribution of baked goods from its Sheetz Bros. kitchen bakery and commissary.
“Delivering fresh products to every single Sheetz location every single day is a critical piece of our operations,” said Stan Sheetz, president and chief executive officer, Sheetz.
The vans provide the precise multi-temperature delivery conditions needed to ensure product freshness and maintain shelf life for deliveries to the more than 450 Sheetz locations spread across Maryland, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia, the company says.
Sheetz says the refrigeration units increase distribution efficiency and flexibility by allowing highly efficient, multi-temperature transport. Designed to provide the capacities needed for smaller trucks and vans, the refrigeration units allow controlled temperature settings for dual-temperature zone transportation. The configuration is adjustable; it can be fresh-fresh, fresh-frozen, frozen-fresh, or frozen-frozen.
