Adam March
General Manager Kevin Hancock Ltd

Thermotraffic is rolling out a wide range of value-added services for its customers. And nobody is doing more to make it happen than Adam. 

I’m General Manager of the Thermotraffic site in Newark, having been with the company for six years. The Newark site has always specialised in value-added services such as blast freezing and tempering so that we deliver the food to the clients at the temperature they require. One of our objectives as a company is to offer these services across the company so I’ve been visiting our other sites to assist in the process.

In particular, it was great to help out at the Maasvlakte site in the Netherlands. It’s always interesting to meet new people and to see their operation, especially abroad. Equally, I enjoyed welcoming our colleagues from Godfroy in France when they came to Newark to see how we operate the value-added services.

Supporting your ideas

I’m always prepared to go wherever they need me and to do whatever they need me to do. This ‘can do’ attitude is supported by the company, which has the resources to get behind new initiatives. For instance, I suggested we offer an X-ray service that checks the product for contaminants such as plastic, metal and bone. This service would normally be performed by another company and involve an extra step and extra time for our customers. A month later I had been trained on a new X-ray system that was up and running here on site. It means that Thermotraffic has become even more of a ‘one-stop-shop’ for customers.

Growing rapidly

At Newark, we typically handle 400 to 500 tons of product per week including butter, pork, beef, lamb, ready meals and pastry. Part of that is around 10 tons of beef each week for a major fast-food chain. 2023 was our best year ever and 2024 has started very strongly. This is partly because, as a company with numerous sites, we can send customers to other sites, which reduces their travel costs. In turn, this frees up capacity here at Newark so that we can pursue new business.

But the company is growing as a whole, including our transport services, with more and more loads from abroad. We take large containers of product from ships that departed from places like Thailand, then load them onto trailers that bring them to the sites.

Professional opportunities

It’s an exciting time for anyone who wants to join us and learn the business. It’s a good company to work for and if you work hard and show willing the company will back you.

In my team, we are 26 people – mainly value-added services staff – and they get to travel to our other sites and access opportunities for professional growth. We’ll help you to train or qualify for whatever role you’re interested in. That includes the Class 1 driver qualification. In addition, we benefit from insurance, pension and a good salary. And we are well supported in areas such as HR and IT.

As for myself, I’m very content here and just happy to assist wherever I’m needed.