Food Safety Focus | Freezer Gear Housekeeping

Food Safety Focus

Hello All!

I hope this message finds all of you and your families safe and well.

Today I want to offer a simple message: Wash that freezer gear!

Anyone who works in the cold will appreciate the freezer suits, gloves, boots and masks that are provided to keep us warm and maintaining a clean a set of freezer gear is important for food safety. 

The gloves you are provided touch everything you touch, including cases of shrimp, chicken, vegetables, etc. and if we don’t take care of them properly, cross contamination can happen.  

Sometimes when we are stacking we hold those cases against our chest or waist so the suit itself gets exposed to cases of product more often than you think.  

The masks worn get wet from ice accumulating around our warm breath passing through the mask material into the cold air.  I’ve been working in the freezer and had my whole mask iced up many times!

Masks and gloves should be hung up in your locker to dry, not placed on machinery or all around the facility.  No one wants glove and mask ice all over the place, please. 

Freezer suits, gloves and your mask should be washed at least once a week.  In fact this is a question on our annual food safety audits so food safety auditors will be looking to make sure you are handling your freezer gear properly while handling food.

Thank you for all that each of you do every Day to ensure safe food for our families!

Justin Straka

Corporate Food Safety Manager

0
Author: Trish Metts