CHEP is set to expand its fish box hire business with a number of initiatives which it expects will boost by up to £150,000 annually.
CHEP’s fish boxes will now be available from Hantsholm, Denmark’s largest fishing port. Previously, Scottish skippers unloading at Hantsholm had to pay nine per cent of their catch’s gross value in labour charges to have the fish weighed, graded and transferred from CHEP boxes to the port’s own boxes.
Now, the fish market managers assume responsibility for a pool of CHEP boxes which are cleaned and then made available for Scottish trawlers.
David Morgan, CHEP’s general manager, said: “Big trawlers can easily unload £100,000 worth of fish so the skipper had to pay £9,000 to have his catch unloaded. In addition, transferring fish from one box to another can damage the quality so the value drops.”
In a linked move, CHEP is providing a similar service in Scotland and now acts as a collecting agent for Pack & Sea, Denmark’s sole supplier of fish boxes.
The boxes are unloaded in Scotland from Danish trawlers and are collected and washed by CHEP.
They are then made available at no charge to Scottish trawlers who use the boxes and then unload them in Denmark.
In the past three months 17 more trawlers have signed up for CHEP.
“Scottish trawlers save money and time by using the CHEP pool in Hantsholm, we have won additional business from Pack & Sea and Scottish skippers get free boxes to use before dropping them off in Denmark. In addition, there are benefits for the environment as boxes which used to return to Denmark by lorry now go by trawler and are used on the way,” added Morgan.
