Refrigeration

Commercial refrigeration for Australian hospitality venues — every cold-side category in one department, spanning storage fridges, freezers, display and drinks cabinets, underbench and prep units, ice machines and blast chillers. If general-purpose cold storage is what you're after, go straight to our commercial fridges range — it's the largest category in the department. Otherwise, this page maps the whole range so you land on the right cabinet first time.

Who this refrigeration range is for

Almost every venue we supply buys from this department more than once. Cafés and restaurants run solid-door uprights in the back of house and glass-door merchandisers out front; pubs, clubs and bottle shops stack beverage cabinets behind the bar; bakeries and patisseries pair cake displays with underbench prep cabinets; caterers and ghost kitchens lean on freezers and rapid chilling to stretch prep across the week. Convenience stores and canteens are increasingly going self-service, with open-deck and glass-door grab-and-go cabinets doing the selling. Whatever the venue, the gear here is built for commercial duty cycles — heavy door traffic, hot kitchens, long trading hours — which is exactly where domestic units fall over.

What's in scope

Storage fridges

The back-of-house workhorses: solid-door upright cabinets in one-, two- and three-door formats, plus chef bases and drawer units that slot under cooking lines. Stainless construction and digital temperature controllers are standard across the serious end of the range.

Display and merchandising fridges

Cabinets that sell while they chill — glass-door upright drink and display fridges, cake and deli showcases, countertop displays and open-deck units for self-service aisles. Lighting, glass area and shelf merchandising matter as much as capacity here.

Underbench and prep refrigeration

Counter-height cold storage that doubles as bench space — under bench fridges in solid- and glass-door formats, plus pizza, salad and sandwich prep cabinets with refrigerated ingredient wells built into the worktop.

Freezers

Upright storage freezers, chest freezers, glass-door display freezers and ice cream cabinets all live in our commercial freezers range — from compact underbench units to multi-door uprights sized for high-volume frozen lines.

Bar, beverage and specialty

Behind-the-counter gear and the harder-to-find categories: bar fridges and backbar cabinets, wine fridges, ice makers from benchtop through modular, and blast chillers for venues cooling cooked food to HACCP timeframes.

How to choose commercial refrigeration in three steps

With this many categories, the fastest route to the right unit is to answer three questions in order.

Step 1 — Chiller, freezer or display?

Decide the job first. Holding stock cold out of sight is a storage chiller. Holding it frozen is a freezer. Selling chilled product to customers who choose by eye is a display unit — and that choice changes everything downstream, because display cabinets trade storage efficiency for glass and lighting.

Step 2 — Size to your peak stock

Capacity is quoted in litres. Work out how much product you need to hold between deliveries at your busiest week — not your average — and add headroom for airflow, since a cabinet packed solid can't circulate cold air. Two mid-size cabinets often beat one giant unit, splitting raw and ready-to-eat stock for food-safety separation.

Step 3 — Pick the format for the position

Match the cabinet to where it lives: upright for floor space, underbench where the unit doubles as a workbench, countertop where there's no floor left. Then check the practical fit — door swing and aisle clearance, ventilation gaps, the climate rating for hot kitchens, and whether the compressor runs off a standard 10-amp outlet (most cabinets in this range do).

Still weighing up cabinet types? Our guide to the types of commercial fridges — upright, display, bar and freezer models walks through each format and where it earns its keep.

Popular picks: two proven starting points across the department are the Thermaster 540L single glass door upright drink fridge for front-of-house merchandising, and the FED-X XF600SS stainless steel upright static freezer for back-of-house frozen storage.

Frequently asked questions

What does commercial refrigeration include?

The category covers all the powered cold-storage and cold-display equipment a food business runs: storage fridges and freezers, glass-door display and drinks cabinets, underbench and prep units, bar and backbar cabinets, ice machines and blast chillers. It's distinct from domestic refrigeration in build quality, compressor duty cycle and compliance with commercial food-safety requirements.

What's the difference between a storage fridge and a display fridge?

A storage fridge is built to hold stock efficiently — solid doors, deep shelves, better insulation and lower running costs. A display fridge is built to sell — glass doors or open decks, internal lighting and merchandising shelves, at the cost of higher energy use. Venues usually need both: storage cabinets in the kitchen, display cabinets where customers choose.

What temperature should commercial fridges and freezers hold?

Under Australian food-safety standards, potentially hazardous chilled food must be kept at 5°C or below, so chillers are typically set around 1–4°C to keep all zones of the cabinet compliant. Freezers should keep food hard frozen, with -18°C the common operating point. Commercial cabinets use digital controllers so you can verify and log temperatures for your food-safety program.

Can I use a domestic fridge in a commercial kitchen?

It's a false economy. Domestic units aren't designed for constant door openings, 24/7 operation or hot commercial kitchens, so they struggle to hold safe temperatures under load — a problem when your food-safety program depends on staying at 5°C or below. Commercial cabinets carry heavier compressors, faster temperature recovery and warranties that actually apply to business use.

What is a self-service fridge?

A self-service fridge is a display cabinet customers serve themselves from — either an open-deck unit with no doors, or a glass-door merchandiser. They're the standard fit for grab-and-go drinks, sandwiches and salads in convenience stores, canteens and café front counters. Open decks maximise impulse sales; glass-door units hold temperature more efficiently and cost less to run.

Do you deliver refrigeration equipment Australia-wide?

Yes. Commercial Kitchen Store delivers nationwide, including Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth metro plus regional freight routes. Larger cabinets ship on a pallet to a ground-floor point, so check door and corridor clearances before ordering — or call our Australian-based team on 1300 111 901 and we'll help you size and spec the right unit.