Britannia AuctionsCatering and hospitality equipment auctions in Aberdeen
Hotels in Aberdeen are built around the oil industry, and the oil price sets their occupancy. When it is high the rooms are full of crew changing over, and the restaurants serve breakfast from five in the morning. When it falls, hotels close or cut back, and their kitchens come to market. We can sell in either half of that cycle, and the method is the same in each.
Supply base canteens are the second stream. The service companies and fabrication yards at Altens and Tullos feed shift workers on site, and when a contract ends or a yard consolidates, the canteen is sold with the workshop. Offshore catering firms also keep training kitchens and stores onshore, and galley equipment built for a platform has a specialist market of its own.
We sell it all by online timed auction, from the premises where access allows.
Crew hotels and the oil price
A crew hotel kitchen is a volume kitchen. Breakfast for a full house every day means a long hot holding run, a couple of combination ovens, a bank of fryers and griddles, a bulk dishwasher and a walk in cold room with a freezer beside it. When the hotel closes, the condition is described lot by lot, and a kitchen cleaned to a hotel standard every night usually shows it.
Access is often a service yard and a goods entrance, but we check the turning space, the loading and the door sizes on the first visit and put that in the catalogue. Collection is booked in slots so buyers are not queuing in the yard. Where the hotel is still trading a reduced operation, we sell the surplus and leave the working kitchen alone.
Bidding is online and open to buyers across the UK, and the pub, cafe and restaurant trade in Westhill, Stonehaven, Inverurie and Ellon is near enough to view in person. Smaller lots can travel by courier.
Galley kit and the supply base canteens
Offshore galley equipment is not the same as restaurant equipment. It is built to marine specification and bolted down, and it is often rated for a different electrical supply. When an offshore caterer sells its onshore training kitchen or its spares store, the lots include marine ranges, fiddle rails, galley fridges and dishwashers built for a vessel. The market for it is other offshore caterers, ship chandlers, vessel operators and fishing boat owners, and because bidding is online that market is not limited to Scotland.
The supply base canteens at Altens, Tullos and Dyce are plainer. A servery, a range, upright fridges and a dishwasher, in a building with a loading bay and a forklift. They sell as a section of the yard sale and go out on pallets with the rest of the plant.
We describe galley equipment carefully, with the rating plates photographed, because a buyer fitting out a vessel needs to know exactly what they are bidding on.
What these sales can include
- Cooking ranges and ovens
- Combination ovens
- Fryers and griddles
- Cold rooms and walk in freezers
- Upright and under counter refrigeration
- Display and serve over counters
- Dishwashers and glasswashers
- Ice machines
- Espresso machines and grinders
- Stainless steel tables and sinks
- Extraction canopies
- Bar equipment and beer coolers
- Tables, chairs and banquette seating
- Tills and till systems
How the sale runs
We visit, agree what is in the sale and catalogue it. Each lot is photographed and described as it stands, with known faults noted. The sale is listed online and marketed to operators and dealers across the UK. Buyers view on a set day and bid online, with lots closing in sequence on the sale date.
Lots are offered as seen under the auction terms, and buyers are expected to inspect before bidding. The buyer pays the hammer price plus a buyer's premium, with VAT charged where it applies and shown separately. We take payment before anything is released.
Collection follows over a window agreed with you. Buyers arrange and pay for removal, and our staff attend so that services are dealt with correctly and the premises are left as agreed with the landlord.
The catering and hospitality equipment auctions page covers what a catering sale looks like, disconnecting services and extraction, what your lease allows you to sell, clean it, label it, leave it working.
Questions about selling in Aberdeen
- The hotel is closing but the group may reopen it later. Should we sell or store the kitchen?
Storing a commercial kitchen has costs on both sides of the decision. Refrigeration deteriorates when it stands unused, seals dry out and compressors can fail on restart, and the storage has to be paid for in the meantime. Against that, a nearly new kitchen may be worth holding for a shorter period, and equipment bought new at reopening comes with a warranty. We will look at the age, the condition and the likely storage period with you and give you a straight view before you commit.
- Our canteen is inside a secure yard with induction rules. How do buyers collect?
We work with your site rules. Buyers get a booked slot, we send you their names and vehicle details in advance, we are on site during collection to escort them, and we hand you a signed release list at the end. If the induction takes an hour, we tell buyers that in the listing so they allow for it. On some yards it is simpler to move the catering lots to a holding area by the gate before collection day, using your forklift, so buyers never enter the working part of the site. We plan whichever route suits you.
More questions about catering equipment