No surprise to those in the Alaskan Bush fresh produce is “King”

No surprise to those in the Alaskan Bush fresh produce is “King”

ANCHORAGE, ALASKA-(Jan. 26, 2010)—For those of you who know Alaska and have experienced the Alaska bush the following will not be a big surprise. To others it will be an eye opener about shipping perishables in Alaska.

In Rural Alaska there are no supermarkets, fast food restaurants, or quick stop grocery stores. In fact-- in most villages there is only one store, and it will probably be the only source of ammunition, fuel, soda pop and pampers, and usually a family owned mom and pop store. These village stores are not on a road system, a rail system and most are only accessed by aircraft and or seasonally by a barge.

So the revelation of Walter Williams of Dillingham was understandable when he saw the Tednologies, Inc. shipping containers that peaked his interested.

Here is the scene.

If you are lucky enough to live in a hub city like Bethel, Nome or Kotzebue you have additional options of a store owned by a Canadian company that has its roots in the Hudson Bay Company. But they too have their challenges bringing perishable foods to market that are palatable

Recently at the Alaska School Nutrition Conference at the Egan Center in Anchorage dozens of food vendors showed their wares, food products like pizza, pocket sandwiches, pasta dishes, and breakfast foods to school district  food service buyers.

While most of these presentations were pre-processed foods, (with the exception of Taco-Loco who makes a fresh salmon burritos) the vendors offered packaged or reheated food.

Most of the buyers were looking for fresh foods, others were forced into a pattern of buying processed long shelf life food products due to the distance of their schools from urban locations. Several of the buyers were encouraged at the ability to get shipments from urban Alaska centers of fresh produce for their students but have had discouraging results.

“I would like to offer some apples, or oranges or something fresh for the kids at least one day a week,” said Walter Williams, a food service manager for the Southwest Region School District in Dillingham. “I just want the kids to have a solidly balanced diet.”

Williams tells a story of offering the local regional market the ability to give-back to the local Dillingham region by letting them order produce and piggy-back on their orders with an offer to pay any freight overages.

“I even offered to pay 50 percent of the order for apples or oranges, just to make sure that we could do this but they refused because of problems with bypass mail,” said Williams.”They didn’t want to order anything perishable because it is ruined sitting out on the ramp at the airport.”

Bypass mail is an order up to 1,000 pounds that is shipped from a warehouse wholesaler or retailer to the buyer that bypasses the US Post Office, shipped warehouse to receiver via air freight in Alaska by carriers that are qualified or ‘tendered’ to move these types of shipments.

Williams’s story is not unusual. In the summer months shipments sit on the ramp of airports waiting for pick-up in the heat of the day, in the winter it’s the same, but the shipments of lettuce, bananas, and apples sit on the ramp in frigid sometimes sub-zero conditions.

“We have the solution to this problem but we are having a tough time convincing the buyers to use our containers,” said Ian Wilson, marketing manager with Tednologies, Inc. “The problem is the buyers believe that the air carriers have these containers already. And the air carriers think that the buyers should buy the containers. If they don’t then it’s too bad let the shipment be spoiled.”

Williams looked over the azure blue containers on display at the Alaska School Nutrition Conference and decided to try forcing shipments in the containers to the Bristol Bay Community.

Tednologies, Inc. has various sized containers that can be used to successfully ship perishable items, have temperature controls and monitoring and are basically an indestructible container.

“If only they would use them once, the results speak for themselves”, said Wilson.

Tednologies, Inc. offers hot and cold shipping containers and has devised the only LD-3 container that can be used for up to five days on battery power for frozen or heated foods.

For more information contact sales@palletguy.net

Now is the season to fix broken shipping gear

Now is the season to fix what's broken or overused!

ANCHORAGE, AK (January 15, 2010)--Winter is the time to prepare for the shipping rush coming next spring and summer. Construction and re-stocking for the next year as well as bypass mail will increase in what we here in Alaska call the “Denali Affect.”

The Denali Affect  (named after 20,320 ft. Mt. McKinley) is a peak in air freight shipping and passenger travel here in Alaska that shows signs of increasing in the early shoulder season (late April) and peaks into Aug. then declines into flat traffic after mid October.

“During the winter time lull—we are can fix your nets or pallets or those broken down igloos that you have behind the hangar,” said Ian Wilson, marketing manager for Tednologies, Inc. a sister company to Harman’s Repair Station.

So now is the time to think about getting your pallets, vertical nets and horizontal nets repaired or replaced. Harman’s Repair is just the place to do just that.

Don Harman has worked hard to create a warehouse of parts and supplies as well as sewing equipment, cookie pallet and igloo repair equipment located right in the heart of Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport.

“We are an FAA Certified Part 145 repair station that can fix or repair your nets, igloos or shipping containers right here in Anchorage,” said Don Harman, president of Harman’s Repair Station.

Harman opened his business four years ago after 20-years of experience working in the commercial aviation business in Alaska and today offers expert repair to your shipping implements.

Another advantage using this company is their ability to use stronger and more fire retardant materials.

“We are now making cargo nets that are stronger and fire resistant to replace the original equipment, “Wilson said. “The nets can act as both a safety barrier for shifting loads and may act as a fire barrier during shipping. This is yet another safeguard to flight crews during shipping.”

Harman’s Repair Station is located at 3511 Postmark Dr. across from the FedEx Facility and behind the DHL sorting facility.

No need to panic in an emergency over food safety using Tednologies technology

There is no need to panic over food safety using Tednologies technology!

Anchorage, AK--( Jan. 8, 2010)--The U.S. Food Safety Inspection Service has issued a special winter time warning about how to handle perishable foods during an emergency. While we here in Alaska may have the solution due to our cold wintertime temperatures there are other preventative measures availablel.
I recently interviewed Don Harman at Tednologies, Inc. and he showed me the full array of  shipping containers that they have available for commercial use. Some of these have battery operated hot/cold temperature control devices built into them.
Yes, just plug them in to keep them charged-- they use less energy than a regular sized refrigerator. When the power goes off they can keep perishable foods cold down to 32F for up to five days.
While Harman thinks that the FSIS has some good information on how to prevent perishable foods from spoiling during a power outage his company offers viable solutions to thwart shipping and emergency food safety.

Here is what the FSIS offers:

ABCD’s of Keeping Food Safe in an Emergency

Always keep meat, poultry, fish, and eggs refrigerated at or below 40 °F and frozen food at or below 0 °F. This may be difficult when the power is out.

Keep the refrigerator and freezer doors closed as much as possible to maintain the cold temperature. The refrigerator will keep food safely cold for about 4 hours if it is unopened. A full freezer will hold the temperature for approximately 48 hours (24 hours if it is half full) if the door remains closed. Obtain dry or block ice to keep your refrigerator as cold as possible if the power is going to be out for a prolonged period of time. Fifty pounds of dry ice should hold an 18-cubic foot full freezer for 2 days. Plan ahead and know where dry ice and block ice can be purchased.