Walk-In Freezers

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Stock up on all the frozen goods your business needs with a walk-in freezer.

Restaurants, bars, and commercial kitchens of all sizes use walk-in freezers to store bulk quantities of frozen foods and ingredients. The right walk-in freezer for your business will offer enough storage capacity without taking up too much of the space within your kitchen. Budget, flooring, compressor location, and other factors also need consideration.

Walk-ins offer conveniences and efficiencies that make them a worthwhile investment for many foodservice operators. While custom walk-ins are built to your exact specifications or needs, prefabricated walk-ins offer the benefits of being less expensive and versatile enough to expand or relocate with your growing business. Both prefabricated and built-in (custom) units are available in a range of floor plans, sizes, and configurations. Built-in walk-in freezers are typically constructed using insulation covered by structural tiles, whereas prefabricated units are engineered with pre-made urethane panels that are designed to be quick to set up and easy to expand.


Walk-in freezer floors

A walk-in freezer can be purchased with or without a floor. Built-in floors are typically engineered with a skid-resistant metal, like aluminum. Be sure to select a walk-in without an included floor if you want to use custom tile or other flooring material.


Indoor vs. outdoor walk-in freezers

Whether built-in or prefabricated, you will want to consider the overall dimensions, floor type and whether your walk-in will be installed indoors or outdoors. Indoor and outdoor walk-ins each have advantages.

An outdoor walk-in is especially useful if you have space constraints inside your building, as well as reducing your electric bill by releasing hot air outside and not inside your building. Keep in mind that walk-in freezers installed outside will need to have a special housing over the compressor to protect it, and the exterior of the unit should have added coatings of either paint or epoxy to protect the metal from rusting in the elements. Depending on your location and climate, you may need increased protection for your box to maximize the lifespan.

Indoor units are typically less expensive and easier to access for employees, making it easier to quickly grab food and ingredients. If you want an indoor walk-in freezer, be sure you take accurate measurements of your available space.


What size walk-in freezer should I get?

There are two primary considerations for choosing the size of your walk-in freezer. How large is the area available for the walk-in freezer? And how much storage space do you need in your walk-in freezer?

The insulation is approximately 4” thick on each side, so you will also have to account for this when calculating storage capacity you need in the unit. As a rule of thumb, you will need 1 cubic ft. of space for every 28 lbs. of food.


Lifespan of a walk-in freezer

Manufacturers estimate an average lifespan of 15 years in normal conditions and with normal use for a walk-in freezer. They can last beyond that with proper care and maintenance.


Other Refrigeration Options

In addition to a walk-in freezer, check out commercial reach-in freezers, refrigerated prep tables, and walk-in coolers for the frozen food storage needs of any busy commercial kitchen.