ISG has successfully completed an innovative fast-track project to transform a former Tetley bottling plant in Leeds into a new Asda merchandising centre, training facility and office accommodation - delivering the project in just eight weeks.

Located adjacent to the supermarket chain's headquarters in the West Yorkshire city, the 103,000 sq ft unit accommodates dummy Asda store configurations to facilitate the trial of new merchandising concepts as well as a host of other innovations.

The building also becomes an important extension to existing facilities within the supermarket's main head office, located just 300 yards away. Additional accommodation includes 18 new meeting rooms, including a new boardroom, 200 hot desks and a new skills academy, incorporating six training rooms connected by folding partition walls to create a flexible space that can be used for multiple training requirements. The high specification fit out also included a new 700-seat auditorium, with ISG re-using 500 seats from Asda's existing auditorium to minimise waste, and a state-of-the-art virtual reality suite, which will showcase new store concepts without the need to make any physical changes to the building.

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During the eight-week programme, ISG chalked-up over 30,000 incident free man hours successfully completing the project, which included the installation of an 8,000 sq ft mezzanine structure, constructed using 18,000 tonnes of steel. Some 10,000 shelves and 9,000 sq ft of refrigeration cabinets were also installed within the dummy store area.

(CD/JP)