Meat, smallgoods and hospitality cold chain, inner east Brisbane
EZ Trans runs refrigerated transport in Murarrie, Colmslie and Cannon Hill, carrying chilled meat, smallgoods, dairy and prepared food from the Metroplex on Gateway precinct to inner-east venues and wholesalers. Our Kedron depot is about 16 kilometres away, roughly 20 to 25 minutes, and every drop carries its own temperature record.
Cannon Hill was a meat address long before it was a retail one, and the saleyards and meatworks history still shapes what moves through the pocket. Carcass and carton beef, poultry, smallgoods and prepared meals all pass through here, and product with that little tolerance needs temperature-controlled transport rather than a general courier.
Next door, Metroplex on Gateway put modern warehousing at Murarrie within sight of the motorway ramps, so Colmslie and Murarrie now hold the food distributors and cold stores that supply venues across the inner east and the bayside. Our Kedron depot sits about 16 kilometres away, roughly 20 to 25 minutes on the Gateway Motorway, which suits an early hospitality round.
The freight profile here is protein and prepared food. Carton beef and lamb, poultry, smallgoods, portioned meals, dairy and dessert lines leave the precinct for pubs, clubs, restaurants, butchers, caterers and independent grocers. Most of it moves early, in small quantities, to receivers whose delivery window is measured in minutes rather than hours, and often into venues where the only cold room is behind a public bar.
Lytton Road does the heavy lifting. It feeds Metroplex on Gateway and the Murarrie warehousing behind Metroplex Avenue and Queensport Road, then runs west into Colmslie past the older sheds toward Colmslie Road and the riverside yards. On the Cannon Hill side the work is along Wynnum Road, Barrack Road and the Creek Road corner, where retail and light industrial sit on top of each other and loading docks are shared, shallow and often blocked by a delivery van.
Access is the local advantage. Gateway Motorway and Port of Brisbane Motorway ramps are minutes from most of these docks, so a Murarrie collection can be over the river or heading south quickly. The trade-off is the Lytton Road and Wynnum Road congestion either side of the Gateway interchange, which is the main reason our meat rounds start before the commuter build-up rather than after it.
A butcher taking hanging product and a club taking frozen portions do not need the same body, the same loading order or the same paperwork. Most cold chain trouble on a mixed round starts with treating them as one job.
| Product form | Vehicle and loading | Main risk on a round | Typically suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hanging or carcass meat | Rail fitted body, loaded last, minimal door time | Contact contamination and swing damage across multiple stops | Butchers and processors taking sides or whole carcasses |
| Carton chilled meat and smallgoods | Chilled body, stacked or palletised in drop order | Surface warming through repeated door openings on a long round | Wholesalers, venues and retail with early windows |
| Frozen portioned and value-added lines | Frozen set point, bulkhead or blankets if sharing space | Partial thaw when carried beside chilled product | Food service, catering and clubs holding stock |
| Chilled and frozen on one vehicle | Bulkhead split, two set points, frozen loaded first | A compromise temperature that suits neither half of the load | Small distributors sending both on a single run |
Accreditation is a legal requirement for certain food activities in Queensland, and Safe Food Production Queensland sets out which businesses need it, including those transporting meat, eggs, dairy, seafood or horticulture produce. Under the Meat Food Safety Scheme, Transporter (Meat) is a listed accreditation type, and moving meat from where the animal is killed through to a retailer is an accreditable activity. If your product sits inside that scheme, expect the transport arrangements to come up in your own audit conversation.
Alongside that, food carried under temperature control must be held at 5C or colder, or 60C or hotter, and those limits apply through receipt, storage, display and transport, not just while the vehicle is moving. We plan the run around the handling and temperature requirements of the freight, and we are straightforward with clients about which approvals sit with the producer and which sit with a carrier. That distinction is worth settling early, which is part of what we cover in choosing a logistics partner.
A hospitality round is a sequence of small temperature insults, and the answer is sequencing and discipline rather than simply setting the unit colder. A colder body does not fix a load that spends four minutes on a footpath at every stop.
Where a buyer wants chain-of-custody evidence, we agree the format before the first run so the record matches what their quality officer actually asks for. Product heading further afield can move from the same collection onto our interstate refrigerated services.
Coming from Murarrie or Cannon Hill, the depot is about 16 kilometres north. The usual run is the Gateway Motorway across the river, then Sandgate Road and Gympie Road across to Castle Street, Kedron, roughly 20 to 25 minutes outside peak. Written directions to our Kedron depot cover the final turns and dock access.
Every area we cover is listed on the service areas index.
Yes. Carton meat, smallgoods, poultry and prepared food make up much of what we carry through Cannon Hill, Murarrie and Colmslie. Meat transport in Queensland sits under the Safe Food Queensland Meat Food Safety Scheme, so we plan the run around the handling, temperature and documentation the product requires.
About 16 kilometres, roughly 20 to 25 minutes outside peak using the Gateway Motorway. Early morning runs into Murarrie are usually clean. Add time from mid-afternoon, when Lytton Road and the Wynnum Road approaches to the interchange bank up. Treat the figure as an estimate rather than a guaranteed transit.
Yes, and it is routine work in this precinct. We load in reverse drop order, keep door time short and take readings across the round rather than only at loading. Venues with no dock or a shared service laneway get noted in the run plan so the driver is not improvising at dawn.
Yes. Chilled, frozen and ambient holding lets an inner-east distributor keep a buffer without leasing more cold room, and stock can be released into deliveries as orders land. Storage and transport are quoted together, based on volume, the temperature required and how often the stock turns over.
The consignment names the temperature band the load must hold, the driver logs readings at loading and at delivery, and the signed receipt captures anything unusual at the dock. Where a buyer runs a chain-of-custody requirement, we align our record to what their auditor asks for before the first run.
Send through the product, the temperature band, the drop list and the delivery windows, and we will quote the round the way it actually runs, early starts included. You can book a job online or call the depot to talk it through with the operations team.
