After a year of traveling the country visiting shops, early weekend starts to set up markets and the fun stuff like packing boxes for delivery, we have reached our 12 month milestone to celebrate our one year anniversary!!! We wouldn’t be here without our beloved customers and fans, so we thought we’d take this opportunity to share some insights into the previous 12 months…
Olive Branch launched in July 2011 and what a year it has been! My passion for Olive Oil has been part of me since I was a child and my father would take me Olive picking each December. I had wanted to turn my passion for Olive Oil into a business for many years so after some encouragement from my partner Kamil, I started a journey of market research, product and business planning and the fun stuff that is designing the brand and packaging. We finally received our first pallet of 1L bottles in July and launched our lovely co-operative made Olive Oil at a tasting session which took place at an Outdoor Opera in Central London.
Of course we were a little nervous as this was our first public event but nonetheless we were eager to see the guests’ reaction to our Olive Oil. We could not have been more pleased! We were met with a really positive reception – people were amazed at the fresh taste of our product, something many of you reading this will surely agree with. Moreover, the guests were very complementary about our product presentation and about our knowledge of Olive Oil in general – it was such a pleasure to launch the product and throughout the journey home, we could not stop talking about the next course of action.
Soon after, we began to trade at markets in and around London. Trading at markets has been a wonderful way of meeting fellow ‘foodies’ and we have made many new friends from fellow foodies to artists to musicians! We now have a weekly pitch at Brockley Market and in addition to our Olive Oil we also sell Koroneiki Olives, the ones we use to make our Olive Oil as well as various other treats Cretan and Greek treats.
Our mission is to make good quality Olive Oil available at a reasonable price and we do this by managing the production and supply chain ourselves, from caring for the Olives to visiting shops around the country. Visiting independent food shops and delicatessens to introduce our product has been one of the most exciting areas of this past year. Shop owners and buyers are without doubt Britain’s ‘real’ food critics as without passing them, we cannot get our products to you the public. We’ve received great feedback on the freshness of our Olive Oil and the attractive and engaging branding has recently been endorsed by none other than Mick Whitworth, Editor of Fine Food Digest, who selected our Olive Oil to be an Editor’s Choice product based on the elements of taste, branding, packaging and sellability!
The journey doesn’t stop here….
Our mission is to introduce the British public to good quality and healthy food products, themed around Olive Oil. This took us to our next product which has been described as a true innovation and possibly even a revolution! Olive Oil Jam…that’s right, a magical combination of Olive Branch Olive Oil with Dried Fruit and Cretan Honey to create a taste sensation that will change people’s diets forever!
We are launching Olive Oil Jam at the turning point of our 12 month anniversary and as we look into the future, we are already plotting several new product launches so watch this space for more details.
We wouldn’t be here without you our beloved customers and fans so we would like to thank you once again for all your support and encouragement over these past 12 months. It’s been a great adventure, a real pleasure meeting so many great food-minded people (!) and we’re excited about the next 12 months as we continue on the road ahead.
Best wishes
Maria Koinaki, Founder of My Olive Branch Ltd