Rapid-Cook Oven Revealed

Thought Leadership

Spotlight: Convenience Store Rapid-Cook Ovens Revealed

Like many convenience stores, our customer was expanding their freshly prepared food offerings and adding cooking equipment to their 24/7 operations. They installed at least 2 rapid-cook ovens at each of their stores; but before SiteSage had no visibility in to the cost of operating those ovens and specifically the electricity usage of leaving them […]

Merry ChefLike many convenience stores, our customer was expanding their freshly prepared food offerings and adding cooking equipment to their 24/7 operations. They installed at least 2 rapid-cook ovens at each of their stores; but before SiteSage had no visibility in to the cost of operating those ovens and specifically the electricity usage of leaving them on “keep warm” 24/7. SiteSage energy data revealed that at one location, the two ovens used more electricity than every circuit in the store except only their HVAC units. SiteSage than helped the customer gain two more insights: first, the ovens were actually very lightly used, with some averaging under 15 total cooks throughout the day, and at predictable busy periods. Second, there was a compelling business case to shutting 1 of 2 ovens down during slow periods.

The chart here tracking energy usage for one oven shows a handful of “spikes” that correspond to cooking product. The rest of the energy usage is just from “stand-by” mode when the oven stays warm by cycling between 550W and 1500W. If we say the average electric demand for stand-by is 1000W, then turning off 1 oven for 12 hours per day would save 12 kWh (about $1) per day per store. If you multiply that by every day of the year, and by every store in their portfolio, that is a lot of energy! Based on this information, the customer decided to implement a behavioral program, using SiteSage to track how well stores are following through on shutting ovens off and how much money is being saved or wasted.

Interested in learning more about best practices for energy and asset management in convenience stores?