IN Brief:
- Highfrost’s new frozen warehouse in Gullegem will provide capacity for about 55,000 pallets.
- The site is designed for 600 pallet movements per hour and automated box picking at up to 1,200 boxes per hour.
- Solar panels, energy recovery, heat reuse, and water-saving refrigeration measures are built into the facility.
Highfrost is preparing to open a fully automated frozen warehouse in Gullegem, Belgium, adding major high-bay capacity for food logistics and deep-freeze storage.
The facility is expected to become operational in mid-2026 and will provide space for around 55,000 pallets. Standing about 45 metres high, the warehouse is designed around automated handling, high-density storage, robotic box picking, and value-added logistics activity for frozen food flows.
Designed to handle about 600 inbound, outbound, and internal pallet movements per hour, the site will also include an automated box-picking system with a capacity of up to 1,200 boxes per hour. Robot and camera technology will support box selection and handling, while AI-driven functions are intended to improve flexibility across changing order profiles.
The development includes a multilevel front extension of around 3,000 m² for value-added logistics, offices, and support operations. A packing facility for unpackaged products is also expected to follow, widening the site’s role beyond pallet storage and into more complex frozen food logistics services.
Sustainability features have been built into the design. The warehouse will use about 7,500 m² of solar panels, while a 2D shuttle system will recover energy during operation. Residual heat from cooling processes will be reused, and efficient refrigeration systems with air-cooled condensers are expected to reduce water use significantly compared with conventional evaporative systems. Truck power supply infrastructure is also planned for refrigerated units.
Cold-chain warehouses are among the most difficult logistics assets to operate efficiently. Energy demand is high, labour conditions are demanding, and disruption can create immediate product risk. Automation can improve safety, speed, and storage density, but it also raises the need for robust software, maintenance planning, and operational contingency.
The Highfrost project sits within a wider European move towards automated food logistics. Food manufacturers and retailers are seeking frozen and chilled capacity that can handle more product variety, tighter delivery windows, and stricter energy performance expectations. Domino’s £25m Avonmouth supply chain centre shows how food distribution investment is being tied more closely to production resilience, service levels, and network scale.
Specialist warehouse automation is also expanding beyond ambient retail and e-commerce fulfilment. Mecalux’s automated medical logistics system for Gerresheimer demonstrates how controlled, regulated, and high-integrity environments are adopting automated storage and retrieval. Pallet shuttle systems have also gained traction as operators seek higher density without sacrificing flexibility.
The economic case for frozen automation is becoming sharper. Labour scarcity, high land costs, and energy volatility all favour facilities capable of moving more product through a smaller footprint. Automation still has to match the order structure of the business: pallet storage, layer picking, case picking, and value-added packing all place different demands on conveyors, shuttles, robots, software, and refrigeration zones.
Highfrost’s facility reflects a more integrated model for cold-chain infrastructure. It is being built as a logistics platform where storage density, box-level handling, energy performance, and value-added services sit together. As frozen food supply chains face higher service expectations and tighter scrutiny of energy consumption, automated high-bay cold storage is moving from premium option to strategic capacity.
