The Purple Pantry, Preston

Setcrete Performs for Purple Pantry

Setcrete High Performance floor levelling compound has been used to refurbish the floor of ‘The Purple Pantry’, a community food membership ‘shop’ in Preston, to provide a long-lasting and durable flooring solution for customers. The work was undertaken by the property services division of Community Gateway Association, a community-based housing association, with the High Performance levelling compound supplied through Travis Perkins’ Preston branch.

The Purple Pantry food membership scheme is available to all of the association’s customers, as well as other residents living in the local community. The scheme operates in partnership with FareShare Preston and James Hall & Co to offer tinned, fresh, chilled and frozen food to its members at an extremely affordable cost. Displaying goods in a familiar grocery store layout allows customers to browse and select products of their own choice from a range of more than a hundred different items.

Setcrete High Performance was specified for the refurbishment, following a visit and assessment of the site by Setcrete’s technical services team in response to a request from Travis Perkins to recommend the best solution for the work.

Prior to the levelling compound being installed, the old floorcovering of carpet tiles was removed, along with old adhesive residues to reveal a sound, clean and dust-free concrete screed. Following a moisture test, it was found that excess moisture was present in the screed, so a liquid damp proof membrane (DPM) was applied over the screed before the levelling compound was applied.

Once the DPM had dried, Setcrete Acrylic Primer followed by Setcrete High Performance levelling compound was applied over the entire 113m² area, requiring only minimal work with a smoothing trowel to achieve optimum coverage. Setcrete High Performance is a fibre reinforced, flexible, fast drying floor levelling compound and wearing surface that is ‘walk on’ hard after 1 – 2 hours and is suitable for application over plywood, as well as concrete and sand/cement screeds.

The levelling compound dries to create a super smooth, hard-wearing surface that enhances the aesthetic appearance of the final floor covering and will retain its integrity throughout the lifetime of the installation.

The property services team then installed Altro adhesive-free sheet safety flooring to complete the refurbishment.

Commenting on the project, Gavin Paget, Travis Perkins Managed Services Account Manager for Community Gateway, said: “To minimise the time that The Purple Pantry was out of commission, we needed products that made the installation process quick and easy and enabled the installation team to complete the work in a single day. Setcrete provided expert advice on the best products to use, including the need to apply a DPM to avoid problems caused by excess moisture.”