Gate Gourmet has opened the doors to its new aviation catering facility at Brisbane Airport.
The global aviation catering company’s managing director for Oceania Tony Woodhouse said the new facility would ensure Gate Gourmet was well placed for the expected growth in air traffic at Brisbane in the years ahead, particularly with the new parallel runway expected to open in 2020.
“A key factor behind our investment is that Brisbane is a great airport to work from,” Woodhouse said in a statement.
“Our Brisbane team have a strong network here and as a result, we simply outgrew our previous location at Hakea Street.
“This new Westringia Road address is 2,455 square metres – four times bigger than our previous site – giving us both airside and landside access to the tarmac, which is the ideal position to be in with the airport’s second parallel runway coming.”
The company supplies food and other services for about 80 flights a day at Brisbane, with domestic clients including Virgin Australia and Tigerair Australia. Gate Gourmet said it would begin suppling Aircalin from December 1.
Gate Gourmet said its new Brisbane facility, which represented a $6 million investment over five years, featured a cold kitchen, dishwashing and cartwashing, food portioning, bonded stores, assembly and equipment packing. A hot kitchen was due to be completed in 2017.
Brisbane Airport handled 22.5 million passengers in 2015/16, comprising 5.3 million international and 17.2 million domestic travellers. The airport’s 2014 master plan forecasts passenger numbers to reach 11.7 million international and 37 million domestic passengers, for a total of 48.7 million, by 2033/34.
BNE Property’s general manager of commercial businesses John Tormey said the airport was spending $1.4 billion on the new parallel runway and $3.8 billion on infrastructure projects over the next decade.
“Our investment in the airport precinct is more significant than any other Australian airport,” Tormey said.
“We’re excited to be working with Gate Gourmet who have been a long term tenant of the airport and a key support service that helps attract more international services to Brisbane Airport.”
The expanded Brisbane facility complements Gate Gourmet’s operations at Sydney, where it has 31 airline customers.
Some scenes from the official opening can be seen below:
