Halo Handling is a new business venture of SH Pratt Group, one of the UK’s largest importers of fruit – particularly bananas, of which it brings between 23 and 30 million per week into the country.

It operates a bespoke, 108,555 sq ft temperature-controlled facility at DP World London Gateway Logistics Park, which provides services such as ripening, stock control and order processing and distribution.

It has 8,000 pallet locations capable of offering seven separate temperature regimes, from -25 degree centigrade to ambient, across multiple frozen and refrigerated chambers.

The facility’s proximity to the port - and its ability to eradicate container inbound costs - ensures a more sustainable supply chain, cutting waste, cost and time to market, and increasing freshness. This means Halo is reducing its truck movements, its fruit miles and therefore its carbon emissions by thousands of tonnes each week.

The warehouse was a bespoke build for SH Pratt Group; completed in less than 24 weeks, under budget and within eight months of the planning application first being submitted before being handed over for tenant fit-out.