About Us
Why we live for olive oil excellence
Olives have so much more to offer than you’d think
But because they can’t turn themselves into oil they typically rely on being shaken from their tree with a stick before being transported to the mill for extraction. That’s as inefficient as it sounds.
Unlike a fine wine, olive oil really doesn’t get better with age. From the moment they leave the tree, olives lose their magic fast.
As they painfully wait to be loaded onto a van they oxidize and decompose. As they’re driven through miles of winding countryside they become more acidic. And whilst they stew for potentially days, awaiting their extraction process, their nutrients scram faster than a raccoon who’s just stolen your lunch. A slow harvesting and extraction process means all that quality and all those health benefits are left to rot. Literally.
Nothing is more damaging to olives than this process. And chances (most definitely) are, this was how the oil in your kitchen cupboard was made.
Chances are you’re missing out on the good stuff.
But in 2001 a new hope begins to bloom
Familiar with this mismanaged process, our founder Alfonso Swett had the mother of all ah-ha moments.
What if we put the mill in the very heart of the grove?
What if the olives were farmed in high-density, and harvested mechanically at the peak of their ripeness?
What if we could slash the handling and oxidation period from days to a few hours?
And what if we could control and optimize every stage of the operation, from grove to bottle?
His solution transformed an inefficient and faulty process into something that was lightning fast and second to none.
Without haste, he assembled an elite team of experts to bring the operation to life. They decided on Chile’s Colchagua Valley as the ultimate location for their enterprise. Similar to the Mediterranean in climate with long hot summers and mild, wet winters. No soil would be better suited.
Putting the mill in the heart of the grove and extracting the oil within just a few hours means what we make for you has a quality and flavor that’s impossible to challenge.
Sadly, many olives aren’t nearly as fortunate
All across America, olive oil that should only be sold as door lubrication, is finding its way into the kitchens of honest, unwitting Americans.
In fact, 70% of the olive oil that’s sold in the US is fake extra virgin or mixed with other impurities. And the reason for this madness?
Frighteningly little purity regulation in the U.S.
Thankfully it’s a different story down in Chile.
To qualify as extra virgin, olive oil must meet the standard of 0.8% set by the International Olive Oil Council. And seeing as we don’t mess about, ours is, get this… 0.2%.
It’ll be hard to find a purer substance in your kitchen cupboard.
We won’t rest until low grade olive oil is but a distant memory
Without haste, he assembled an elite team of experts to bring the operation to life. They decided on Chile’s Colchagua Valley as the ultimate location for their enterprise. Similar to the Mediterranean in climate with long hot summers and mild, wet winters. No soil would be better suited.
Putting the mill in the heart of the grove and extracting the oil within just a few hours means what we make for you has a quality and flavor that’s impossible to challenge.