As retailers strive to deliver the highest quality fruit possible to their customers, the installation of new ripening rooms is continuing at a breakneck pace, according to Jim Lentz, president at Thermal Technologies in Blythewood, SC.

And he should know. As the largest manufacturer of banana ripening rooms in the industry, Thermal Tech recently completed its second major plant expansion in three years, a new 40,000-square-foot manufacturing facility.

Thermal Tech’s new 40,000 square-foot manufacturing facility in Blythewood, SC.Located next door to its existing corporate headquarters and manufacturing plant outside Columbia, SC, the new building doubles Thermal Tech floor space from 40,000 to 80,000 square feet. Scheduled to go into full operation this fall, the facility will bring fabrication of its racking and sheet metal in-house, removing what has at times been a critical barrier to production.

“Until now, we’ve contracted much of our sheet metal and racking fabrication to trusted partners,” said Lentz. “But no matter how dedicated the partnership, the nature of our workflow has created times when we’ve experienced a bottleneck in production. This new building enables us to bring these two key components in-house, giving us total control over the manufacturing process, greatly improving our operational workflow and efficiency.”

Established in 1987 in suburban Philadelphia, Thermal Tech moved to Blythewood, SC, in 2002.

Its customer list reads like a who’s who of the most successful retailers in North America, from Ahold and Albertson’s to Kroger, Safeway, Sobeys, Wal-Mart and Wegmans, just to name a few.

Before Thermal Tech developed its patented TarpLess design, pressurized ripening rooms used a variety of tarps and airbags to seal off pallets, creating a host of operational and maintenance issues. By eliminating the need for tarps while increasing ripening efficiency and per-box profit, the TarpLess ripening room took the industry by storm and has been leading the way ever since.

Today, over 70 percent of all bananas processed in North America are ripened in Thermal Tech ripening rooms. That adds up to over 100 million pounds of daily ripening capacity. The TarpLess ripening room design is now considered the industry standard and has been expanded to include rooms for ripening pears, avocados and stone fruits, as well as multi-fruit rooms with temperature ranges that can handle everything from pre-cooling to low-temp storage.

The new facility includes a five-ton overhead crane for transporting raw materials within the expansive manufacturing area as well as two new elevated loading dock bays and a 42-foot access door to facilitate shipping. It also adds another 10 employees to the Thermal Tech roster.

“There are risks and challenges with any major expansion,” said Lentz. “Luckily, the timing couldn’t have been any better. We’ve received a number of new orders that will take us right through to the end of the year. Knowing we’ll have complete control over the manufacturing process when the new building goes into operation this fall is already pointing to a solid return on investment. This expansion will play a major role in helping us continue to provide the industry’s most cutting-edge ripening room solutions in the years ahead.”