Retail

Transgourmet Klagenfurt

Transgourmet Austria opens new superstore in Carinthia

Retail experts Wanzl have played a key role in shaping the new Transgourmet superstore in Klagenfurt, the capital of the Austrian state of Carinthia located on the edge of Lake Wörth. As a complete shopfitting solution provider, Wanzl has assisted Transgourmet Austria with everything from identifying its requirements to assembling the finished products – all from a single source. Having opened in June 2024 with a sales area of 3,200 m², the store offers a tailor-made range available for collection and delivery. The full-service wholesale specialist supplies the domestic catering and hotel trade with around 19,000 items, ranging from meat and fish to fruit and even non-food items. Customers can look forward to a number of highlights, including a walk-in humidor with 3,500 premium wines and sparkling wines, international specialities and over 300 regional products, a marketplace for fresh products and a bistro for refreshments and snacks. Wanzl has tailored the design of the store to meet Transgourmet's needs with individual solutions.

A new style of wholesale store for the catering sector

Transgourmet Austria, formerly C+C Pfeiffer, has been an important wholesale partner for the catering and hotel trade in Austria’s tourist regions since 1862. Transgourmet Austria has been working with Wanzl in the field of shopfitting since 2016. Thanks to the two companies' trusting relationship in previous years, the design of the Transgourmet Klagenfurt store is no less than their fifth major project together. “The store has the most extensive range in the region for catering and tourism businesses, which is not only available for collection but increasingly for delivery as well. As orders and purchases are increasingly being place online or by phone, the store experience is all about getting to know new products, finding inspiration and receiving advice from our employees on site,” says Thomas Panholzer, Managing Director of Transgourmet Austria. “With Wanzl's exceptional shopfitting, a visit to the store becomes a shopping experience – from the attractive entrance area to the modern cash desks when leaving the store,” says the responsible project manager at Wanzl. “This Transgourmet location thus represents a new approach to the wholesale superstore.” This year, Wanzl also successfully implemented the newly built Transgourmet Salzburg-Wals-Siezenheim store using the same concept.

“The marketplace is particularly important with its ultra-fresh meat, fish, fruit and vegetable products. It is the heart of the new store in Klagenfurt.”
Thomas Panholzer

There, chefs regularly cook in the Cooking Studio, new products are given a unique stage and customers receive exclusive support with compiling their menus. Specialist salespeople ensure that customers receive comprehensive advice and good service for fresh fish and meat. In the spacious humidor installed by Wanzl, trained sommeliers are on hand to provide assistance related to the broad assortment of wines. The wide range of fruit and vegetables, including exotic varieties, completes the fresh food department. “Together with Transgourmet, we developed a shelving system for the fruit and vegetable department that is a carefully tailored solution for the fruit crates and pallets used by customers and provides the desired additional presentation level,” reports the Wanzl project manager.

Customer-specific product solutions

“We always tailor each of our projects to our customers' specific wishes. Face-to-face meetings, close dialogue from the start of the project and an on-site presence for quick liaison, even in the event of unforeseeable events, are particularly important to us,” explains the Wanzl project manager. “This ensures that we develop the best possible solutions for the customer and all the trades in line with our schedule. Bespoke solutions and individual product adjustments are a matter of course for Wanzl.” Wanzl has already implemented store layouts and conception in other Transgourmet projects in previous years and further refined it for Klagenfurt. For example, the Wanzl wire tech 100 and SL shelves in Transgourmet grey used across the entire range were fitted with gondola end caps according to the customer's individual design throughout the entire sales area for striking product presentations.

To ensure that all processes in the wholesale store run smoothly, Wanzl also created optimum working conditions for its employees – from the provision of state-of-the-art transport trolleys to the fitting of mobile workstations and needs-oriented shelving fixtures. “When matching the shelves of the walk-in cooler to the wall-mounted cooler door dimensions, we took the site conditions accurately into account and also designed a roll-through shelf for quicker filling by the personnel in Klagenfurt – after installing the same shelf at the Salzburg store” says the Wanzl project manager. In addition to the sales area, Wanzl also equipped the 4,600 m² warehouse with heavy-duty shelves including bumpers.

Customer-specific product solutions

Planning and conception of a wholesale store

Almost a year of planning, production and assembly preceded the official opening date of Transgourmet Klagenfurt on 13 June. “The process called for good project and time management so that all the details for the main shelving parts could be coordinated as quickly as possible and go into production. This was followed by a refinement of the remaining areas and ongoing adaptation in the event of change requests,” explains the Wanzl project manager. It took about four months from order placement to the first day of installation. This was followed by seven weeks of assembly in the store. “Thanks to the cross-departmental cooperation between Wanzl Germany and Austria, we were able to cope well with the tight time frame, the rigorously timed assembly and last-minute adaptations,” summarises the Wanzl project manager. Markus Baier, the Transgourmet project manager, also takes a positive stance: “The major Klagenfurt project has once again shown that we have found the ideal partner for designing our stores with Wanzl. Together with Wanzl, we were able to complete the project on time. We are very satisfied with the result and the cooperation and look forward to further projects.”