BRCGS Consumer Products Issue 4 Section 4: Site Standards, From the Fence Line to the Warehouse

By Robert Low, Director, Lead Auditor & BRCGS Approved Trainer

Section 4 is the factory walk section: external standards, security, layout and product flow, building interiors, staff facilities, housekeeping and hygiene, waste, pest control, and product storage, dispatch and transport. It is the part of the audit where the auditor’s eyes do the work, and where a site’s true daily standards are impossible to hide, because you cannot deep-clean your way out of structural neglect the week before.

Outside In

External standards ask for defined boundaries, maintained grounds, sealed building exteriors and managed drainage, because pest control and contamination control both start at the fence line. Security requires controlled access and visitor systems, and the classic test is simply whether the auditor gets challenged walking around unescorted. Layout and product flow must prevent cross-contamination through the logical movement of product, people and waste, with segregation where materials demand it. Map your actual flows honestly, including the informal shortcuts everyone uses, because the auditor will follow the real flow, not the drawing.

The Building and Its Habits

Building interiors, walls, floors, ceilings, doors, lighting, ventilation, must be maintained to protect product, with glass and brittle protection where breakage poses risk. Housekeeping and hygiene wants documented cleaning schedules covering what, who, how and how often, with records and controlled chemicals. The findings that recur: cleaning equipment stored dirty, decanted chemicals in unlabelled bottles, and the cleaning schedule that lists areas nobody has touched in months. Waste requires controlled containers, licensed removal where legally required, and, worth flagging because it catches sites out, the secure destruction of substandard trademarked materials, so your rejects do not resurface on a market stall.

Pests and Storage

Pest control wants a preventive programme, competent contractor or trained in-house resource, proofed buildings, documented inspections and, crucially, evidence that recommendations get actioned. An immaculate pest file with the same unresolved proofing recommendation repeated across four visits is a finding, not a defence. Storage, dispatch and transport closes the section: stock protected and rotated, vehicles inspected and fit for purpose, pallets checked, and product secured against damage and weather in transit.

What Changes Under Issue 5

Issue 5 restructures this section significantly, as per the puplic draft: security becomes site security and product defence with a documented threat assessment, a utilities sub-section arrives, equipment maintenance and contamination controls move in from process control, and enhanced hygiene areas get their own Section 7 for qualifying products, see my enhanced hygiene mapping and the full Issue 5 breakdown. Back to the series hub, or on to Section 5.