A fresh-cut flowers business in South Australia is making waves due to its newly sustainable supply chain.
Hilltop Fresh Flowers, headed up by Ross Trimboli, sources its flowers from Footscray and places them in foldable bins by CHEP.
Once transported to the Kersbrook site, they are picked and arranged, ready for distribution to retailers.
The foldable bins in the system are manufactured from food grade plastic, are impervious to moisture, and can be flat-packed for easy storage.
The bins assist with product storage, temperature control, handling flowers and avoiding the issues typically associated with wet cardboard.
Hilltop decided to transition from cardboard cartons to foldable bins last year in a bid for better supply chain efficiencies, sustainability, quality control, and reducing costs.
“Previously, we would spend up to five dollars per carton and would only get a quarter of the flowers that we can now fit into the bins from the cartons,” Trimboli said.
“It would also take our staff up to four times longer to pack the flowers into cartons compared to what we can do now with the bins.”
Moving from cartons to bins, the company have reduced damages by 80 per cent, minimising wastage. They are also able to reuse the bins.
