First published June 2026. More than 20 sourced facts on the market that keeps Britain's food cold, fresh and out of the bin. Every figure is attributed and every source is linked at the bottom. Lift any of them, a citation back is all we ask.

There is a thin, invisible line between a punnet of strawberries that sells and one that goes in the bin, and it is measured in degrees and hours. That line is the cold chain: the chilled and frozen network of vans, warehouses and sensors that moves perishable food from supplier to shelf without it ever warming up. Most people never think about it. The food industry thinks about little else.

We run chilled and frozen transport and storage, so these are the numbers we work to every day. We have pulled together the UK cold chain and food logistics figures we get asked about most into one place. Each is sourced and linked at the end.

One note on the data. The WRAP food-waste figures and the ONS retail numbers are measured and reliable. The market-size forecasts come from research houses and vary between sources, so treat those as the shape of a trend rather than a number to bank to the decimal.

The size of the UK cold chain

• ~£14bn is the estimated value of the UK cold chain logistics market in 2025. (Allied Market Research)
• ~9.9% is the forecast annual growth rate for the UK cold chain market through 2033. (Allied Market Research)
• $9.4bn was the UK cold chain market in 2025 on a narrower basis, forecast at $9.75bn in 2026. (Mordor Intelligence)
• ~51% of the UK cold chain market is refrigerated storage, with the rest in temperature-controlled transport. (Mordor Intelligence)
• ~42% of cold chain volume is frozen, while chilled services are growing at around 4% a year. (Mordor Intelligence)
• Pharma, food law, e-grocery: the three forces named as driving cold chain growth, alongside sustainability rules. (Mordor Intelligence)

Food waste, the problem the chain exists to solve

• 10.2 million tonnes of food is wasted in the UK every year. (WRAP)
• £19-22bn a year is the cost of that waste to the UK economy. (WRAP)
• 67% of UK food waste, around 6.4 million tonnes, was still edible. (WRAP)
• 70% of food waste comes from households; retail accounts for just 2% and manufacturing 16%. (WRAP)
• 16 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions are linked to edible household food waste alone. (WRAP)

This is the case for cold chain in one line: every degree held and every hour saved buys shelf life, and shelf life is the difference between food sold and food binned. It is the whole point of chilled and frozen transport done properly.

Online grocery and delivered food

• £27.1bn was the value of UK online grocery in 2025, around 12% of all grocery sales. (Mintel)
• 4-5% a year is the steady growth rate for online grocery now the pandemic surge has settled into everyday use. (Mintel)
• ~10% of UK food retail value is now bought online. (ONS / Statista)

Home-delivered food stretches the cold chain right to the doorstep, which is the hardest mile to keep cold. That last leg is exactly where chilled and frozen delivery earns its money.

Frozen and chilled food

• ~$19.4bn was the UK frozen food market in 2025. (Research and Markets)
• ~6.7% a year is the forecast growth for frozen food through 2035, taking it past $36bn. (Research and Markets)
• Convenience and demand for easy meal solutions are the main forces pushing frozen, helped by better freezing technology. (Research and Markets)
• Faster than grocery: frozen food is outgrowing the online grocery market overall. (Research and Markets)

Energy, emissions and compliance

• Most energy-intensive link in logistics: keeping warehouses at chilled and frozen temperatures is among the heaviest power users in the supply chain. (industry)
• Low-emission fleets and energy-efficient cold stores are where sustainability mandates are pushing investment. (Mordor Intelligence)
• F-gas rules are phasing down the high-warming refrigerants cold stores and reefer units have relied on, forcing a retrofit cycle. (gov.uk)
• IoT and digital twins are improving temperature compliance and cost visibility across the chain. (Mordor Intelligence)

What the numbers add up to

Read together, the figures describe a market that is growing faster than logistics as a whole, getting more technical, and carrying a job that matters more than its profile suggests.

Cold chain is a food-waste story before it is a logistics one

The headline that should stop a food business in its tracks is not the market size, it is the 10.2 million tonnes of food the UK throws away each year, two thirds of it edible, at a cost north of £19 billion. Retail and manufacturing are a smaller slice of that than people assume, but the part the supply chain controls is the part temperature control protects. A break in the chain does not just risk a fine. It shortens shelf life, forces markdowns and sends good food to landfill. Cold chain is the cheapest food-waste prevention most brands have, and the most overlooked.

Delivered food made the chain longer and harder

Online grocery is a £27 billion habit now, settled and growing, and frozen food is outpacing it. Both push temperature-controlled product further down the chain, to home addresses and meal-kit doorsteps that were never part of the original cold network. The last mile is the hardest place to hold a temperature, which is why chilled storage close to demand and properly specified frozen warehousing matter more than they used to, not less.

Frozen is quietly winning

Frozen food growing at nearly 7% a year, faster than online grocery, is not a blip. It is convenience, less waste at home, and better freezing technology all pulling the same way. For anyone in food logistics it means frozen capacity, the most capital-intensive and specialised part of the chain, is where demand is heading. The firms with the right freezer space in the right place are holding a scarce asset.

Energy is the cost that will not sit still

Running a cold store is one of the most power-hungry things in logistics, and two pressures are squeezing it at once: rising energy prices and tightening rules on the refrigerants those systems use. The F-gas phase-down means a retrofit cycle is coming for a lot of older cold stores and reefer fleets. The operators who invest in efficient plant and low-emission vehicles now will carry lower running costs and fewer compliance headaches later.

The moat is temperature integrity

Anyone can store a pallet. Far fewer can prove an unbroken chain from supplier to shelf, with the data to back it, across chilled and frozen and through the doorstep. That proof, the sensors, the audit trail, the never-broken cold, is the specialist work food brands actually pay for. It is what separates food and drink logistics from ordinary haulage, and it is where the relationship gets sticky.

What it means if you move temperature-controlled food

• Treat cold chain as food-waste prevention, not just transport. The shelf life it buys back usually pays for it.
• Specify the last mile properly. The doorstep is where the chain breaks most often.
• Secure frozen capacity early. It is the scarcest, most specialised space and demand is rising.
• Ask a partner for the temperature data and audit trail, not just the storage rate. That is the real product.
• Factor the F-gas retrofit cycle into any long contract. Efficient plant will cost less to run within a few years.

The market grows a few points a year. The food it protects is worth far more than that. Get the cold chain right and the waste, the markdowns and the compliance risk all fall at once.

Sources

• Allied Market Research, UK Cold Chain Logistics Market
• Mordor Intelligence, UK Cold Chain Logistics Market
• WRAP, UK Food Waste and Food Surplus Key Facts (July 2025)
• Mintel, UK Online Grocery Retailing Market
• Statista, online grocery sales in the UK
• Statista, proportion of UK food retail sold online
• Research and Markets, UK Frozen Food Market Overview
• ONS, Retail Sales Great Britain, February 2026
• gov.uk, fluorinated gases (F-gas) guidance