Robinsons Brewery, an independent family brewer in UK, recently upgraded its ageing access control system at facilities in Stockport and Bedbury to Grosvenor Technology’s scalable network access control system consisting of HID cards and network door controllers. The new access control system was installed by Advance Security UK.
Robinsons Brewery, an independent family brewer in UK, recently upgraded its ageing access control system at facilities in Stockport and Bedbury to Grosvenor Technology's scalable network access control system consisting of HID cards and network door controllers. The new access control system was installed by Advance Security UK.
The original access control system at Robinsons' Unicorn Brewery in Stockport and Packaging Center at Bredbury was rapidly becoming obsolete when, with the assistance of their electrical contractors Piggott & Whitfield, they approached Advance Security to help update the system. Advance Security immediately recognized that the flexibility of the Janus technology was the ideal solution for the project. However, before they could even start the upgrade, the original system failed and Robinsons had problems with a new batch of cards, as Des Collins, Robinson's Health, Safety and Security Advisor explains:
“We had a batch of cards from our existing supplier that was delivered without the magnetic strip being programmed. When we couldn't get a response from the suppliers Grosvenor stepped in and designed an encoder that allowed us to program the cards ourselves, saving us time and money...Advance also made some temporary repairs to the system to keep us going during the upgrade – all free of charge.”
A phased approach has been adopted that allows the system to be upgraded with minimum disruption and to accommodate available budgets. The access control system also allows Robinsons to upgrade existing swipe card readers to proximity readers. Dual function HID proximity cards that also include the magstripe technology, work on both systems.
Robinsons has realized additional savings by using Grosvenor's Ethernet version door controllers. These are installed directly onto the brewer's existing LAN without the need for extensive new wiring. Each IDC can control two doors/locks and interface to a wide range of industry standard card readers and lock mechanisms. Every card profile associated with a specific IDC is downloaded to the controller to ensure uninterrupted access to the buildings in the event of a network or power failure. Each new version of access control software maintains backwards compatibility with previous versions of controllers, maintaining a client's investment with existing access control hardware that may have been installed over the last 15 years.